The Warlock Alchemist
by Bluemane
Summary: "Will you wield greatness gently?" Harry was told the truth of the strange events around him by Petunia at an early age. However, the result of him exploring his magic led to Dudley's tenth birthday ending rather differently. A near death experience leads to an encounter with a far more sinister Truth. To obtain, something of equal value must be lost. Innocence is no exception.
1. The Consequences

**Chapter One: The Consequences.**

* * *

The Dursley family were proud of their normality, and made their distaste of anything against their standard very clear. From foreigners to the couple at number eight who's sense of fashion was just simply revolting, they didn't discriminate, ironically. As such, Mr Dursley was quite pleased with his normal job as a director of a firm called Grunnings, with a perfectly normal stay-at-home wife and a darling of a son. They would be quite happy if their repetitious life continued as so without anything abnormal getting involved.

And this was the crux of the matter of why they utterly despised their nephew, Harry Potter. For Harry was not a normal child in any sense of the word. His black hair refused to be tamed in any respectable manner, often pointing in various angles that simply defied gravity and products alike. Brilliant lantern eyes that were just such an _unnatural_ shade of vivid green. But his wild looks were not his most freakish feature, no. Harry Potter had _magic._

The very thing that could not be rationalised, nor understood by the Dursleys. It terrified them. But of course, men weren't supposed to be frightened of brats, Vernon Dursley reasoned. So he treated the boy like dirt on his shining shoes, and his wife Petunia and son Dudley followed by example.

Harry simply didn't understand why he was treated so. Why did Dudley get a bedroom, and he got a cupboard? Why was it his aunt and uncle get twitchy whenever something related to magic or fantasy is mentioned? It wasn't fair. For as long as he can remember he was sneered at, disregarded, and hated by his 'family'. Whenever he said something that could be interpreted as backtalk or cheek no matter how ludicrous the reasoning was, he would be punished. Yet Dudley could demand why, scream no at the top of his voice and throw temper tantrums without so much as a sharp word. He _hated_ it.

And so, when he was blamed for turning his teacher's hair blue, _somehow,_ he had enough. He'd already been blamed for something he couldn't explain, when he got stuck on the school roof after being chased by Dudley and his gang.

"I will not tolerate your nonsense, boy! Your freakishness has gone too far!" Vernon roared, spit flying in the face of an seven year old Harry Potter in the hallway of Number Four. "Now, you will apologise to-"

Then, Harry did something he had never done before, because he feared the consequences. He interrupted his uncle.

"No."

Dudley, who was giggling from the top of the stairs, stopped, mouth gaping. Petunia, while preparing to start frying the bacon for Dudleys' after-school lunch, dropped the raw meat on the immaculate kitchen tile.

"I-You...What?!" Vernon spluttered.

"No." Harry repeated, firmly. "My 'freakishness' hasn' gone too far, 'cause I don't know what it is." It wasn't fair, so he wasn't going to let up until he knew why he was getting punished for something he didn't do!

Vernon was simply overwhelmed. First he was being talked back to, and second, well... How could he answer that question?!

"It doesn't matter-" He started, only to be interrupted yet again.

"Yes it does." Harry said angrily. "'Cause I'm always getting blamed for stuff I didn't do an' I wanna know why!"

They glared at each other, short bespectacled seven year old against the fully grown walrus, until Petunia broke the silence.

"Come here boy." Aunt Petunia snapped from the kitchen.

Glancing down the hallway, before looking back to his uncle, he only went when a purple faced Vernon managed a jerky nod.

"Since we obviously can't get rid of it, goodness knows how we tried, we might as well tell him, Vernon." His aunt said, once she was seated at the table, fists clenched on top of the surface. "He just keeps doing it!"

Harry hesitantly took a seat, while Vernon stood at the doorway.

"Your mother could do those freaky things too. And your good-for-nothing father. It's where you got it. We tried to stamp it out of you, we swore we would, but it hasn't worked. I hate it."

"What is _it_?" Harry asked impatiently.

"Magic." Aunt Petunia hissed, as if it was a particularly uncouth curse word.

Wait, if they could explain what was happening, then...

"You knew?!" Harry yelled. "You knew why my hair grew back so fast, how I got on the roof, how her hair turned-"

"Yes of course we knew." Aunt Petunia sneered. "You're just as strange after all, just as, as abnormal as her. Lily got to go with that beastly boy to that castle and learn-"

"Learn? There's others?!"

So it wasn't just him or his family?!

"Yes of course there are. You'll get a letter at eleven like perfect Lily did." His aunt glared. Then, she smiled. Not a pleasant one, however.

"Now you know why we hate you. You're a freak, you keep making those _impossible_ things happen, it's just not normal!"

"Well it's not my fault! I didn't want to be chased by Dudley, I wasn't a cheater like she called me!"

"Liar!"

"Am NOT!"

The half full glass of cola on the table smashed, it's contents splashing everywhere.

Petunia shrieked, pushing back from the table to shield herself while Vernon bellowed, diving behind the doorway.

Harry, meanwhile, sat still, transfixed.

"You see what I mean! You're a FREAK!" His aunt screamed, pointing towards the shattered remains.

"But...why did it happen?" Harry asked timidly.

"I don't know! She could always do all sorts of things, like that blooming flower, just wanting it to happen she forced it to-"

Not a moment later, the shards of glass slowly started floating, before piecing themselves back together. Soon, the glass was whole, although without the liquid content, and nary a crack or chip visible.

Aunt Petunia watched open mouthed, while Vernon gazed worriedly.

"I just wanted it to happen." Harry said weakly. "An' it just did." A beat after, he yawned.

Petunia looked at him closely, muttering to herself.

"Boy, get to your cupboard, NOW." Vernon growled. "No meals-"

"Hush, Vernon."Petunia said softly. "I have an idea on how to fix our, freaky problem."

Harry watched curiously behind half lidded eyes, not really paying attention as Aunt Petunia went back to muttering to herself. He felt really sleepy.

"Here is what we are going to do." She announced. "You're going to get Dudley's second bedroom. We will sort it over the weekend. You'll keep doing your, your magic before bed EVERY day. If you don't, it's back to the cupboard. Do we have a deal?"

Harry couldn't nod faster.

"Good. Now you can make a start with Dudley on sorting what stays and what goes. Run along now."

Harry raced out of the room, excited at the prospect of his own bedroom.

Once they heard the heavy steps reach the second bedroom, Vernon finally spoke.

"What was all that about Petunia?!"

"Don't you see, Vernon! He's done three freaky things today, and look how tired he got!"

"So?"

"So," Petunia started, "it means that doing _it_ gets their kind tired. Lily was the same! It must be like electricity in a battery, if he does it every night, we don't have to see or hear about it! He'll be too used up to make freaky things happen during school if he's letting some of it out! When he gets bratty, he won't have the energy to do it! He'll act like a normal person!"

"I suppose that is good." Vernon said begrudgingly, shuddering at memories of the tantrums the freak had when younger. He felt phantom pain in his knee from when it was broken. "But why the bedroom?"

"His kind will come knocking sometime." She snorted dismissively. "It's best if it looks like we've treated him like a normal person all along. Heaven knows how they expected us to have treated him so though, they gave no help whatsoever! And no taking meals off him!"

"Why not?" Vernon spluttered.

"Because if he goes hungry, he'll probably do freaky things to get food. Or, oh I don't know, maybe his freakishness gets strange, and it starts doing things itself?"

Vernon paled at the thought. No, it was better if the boy could reign it in.

"Right you are Tuney."

"I suppose I'll have to talk to the boy about how they died too, so he knows for when they come. Explain why we got landed with him, I suppose."

Harry meanwhile, was sorting through various bits of broken toys upstairs, and was very excited. He was getting his own room, maybe even his own things, and he wouldn't get blamed for the magical things happening 'cause he knew how to make it do what he wanted! Sure it made him sleepy, but like what Miss Fern always sang (rather annoyingly though) when they were doing spelling, practice makes perfect! He couldn't help but giggle at the thought. Practice makes perfect with 'spelling'! It was all happening because he stood up for himself! Maybe, just maybe, when he shows that he can be helpful by fixing stuff with magic they'd finally care about him!


	2. The Wand

**Chapter Two: The Wand.**

* * *

 _Life,_ an eight year old Harry Potter reflected, _was much better._

He now had his own room, howbeit the smallest, but through the use of his magic (actually approved by Aunt Petunia as long as they didn't see it happen!) had turned it into his own cosy retreat. Like Aunt Petunia had said the day he stood up to Uncle Vernon, he practised his magic every night. Realising he could fix things after the glass, Aunt Petunia had helped him arrange to buy excellently designed but broken down furniture for his room from charity stores with his budget of thirty pounds a month for an allowance. Buying them on the cheap, then using some of the same raw wood bought in after at a close Lumber Yard, he'd work on making his magic fix the furniture to it's original state by using the raw materials to fill what was in need of repair and replacement.

Willingly using his magic was by far the hardest part. His magic had a mind of it's own at the best of times, and as a result it took him weeks of nightly effort to succeed in coaxing it to do what he needed without burning the tips of his fingers, an unfortunate side effect of overuse. Even then when it co-operated, it still took hours to actually made the, in reality, small changes he attempted.

It usually took him a weeks worth of effort on a well used piece to get it sturdy, usable and presentable, although some like his cherry wood bed took _ages._ It was a low down single bed, and was an absolute ruin when Aunt Petunia brought it in. It took him five weeks worth of nights to fix. It may be simply built, but with the designs hand carved in and the blankets he'd manage to accumulate it was snug.

He had some simple drawers, unfortunately he never found any made from cherry and had to settle for oak.

His pine desk however, was his absolute favourite. He hadn't found it anywhere, he'd actually made it himself with his magic! Seeing so many different designs, he couldn't settle on what one he wanted. So as his first major project, he built it himself, incorporating all sorts of things into it. Hidden drawers (so Dudley didn't go snooping for his private stuff), and a little raised area lined with a single row of pigeon holes, drawers at each end. He just loved sitting there and messing about with his magic to try and build things, or cosy up to read. It was hard, but fun and rewarding work.

Now, he didn't do as many chores and Dudley took them over, with much complaint. But Aunt Petunia stood firm, telling him that it would be a good way to build up muscles and grow big and strong. Of course, this didn't work for Harry as he didn't exactly have a good diet. However, Dudley did not retaliate against Harry for having given him chores to do for the first time.

Dudley didn't bother him much now though in school too, ever since the night of him moving in. He threw a tantrum, expecting as always to get his own way, only to be harshly put down by Aunt Petunia. Apparently she had always knew Dudley bullied him, but was only putting a stop to it now after his violent display with the glass. She explained to Dudley that if he kept hurting Harry, his cousin could make freaky things happen to him. Painfully.

Dudley and his gang left him alone, and Harry was happy to not be bothered. 'Freaky' things didn't happen anymore at school, and as such his aunt said he deserved a treat for it. Every month when they went charity store shopping, they'd stop by the local reptile house for Harry to see.

He had asked her in his excitement without thinking after a few visits if he could get a pet, as he had discovered that some of them he could actually talk to, though he had better success with snakes. He'd managed to keep it a secret from his aunt, as he knew it had to be magic related.

Aunt Petunia's lips thinned, but simply said that his school allowed them, so she'd think about it. Admittedly, she couldn't remember what the list of accepted pets where, although she could remember two houses having something to do with snakes and birds, but it would be the school's problem, not hers.

Harry still did a multitude of chores around the house, but his aunt and uncle were more neutral to him now. After seeing his work with the furniture Petunia had, however begrudgingly, said magic had some uses.

Aunt Petunia had eventually explained to him the true circumstances behind his parent's deaths, though he was very angry about being lied to about it. In his aunt's words, an 'evil freak' blew up his parents and their home, and their old teacher dropped him off without warning on their doorstep. The 'black freak' who lead the evil freak to them was in their 'freaky prison' somewhere on the ocean.

Aunt Petunia confessed to not having anything of theirs as all their worldly belongings were took by the freaks into storage in their world. Something she was both paradoxically pleased about and resentful of.

She would answer, although hesitantly, some of his questions about this hidden world. After being told they had magic wands, Harry wanted his own.

And this led him outside, looking for a good stick to use. Wandering the neighbourhood, he was trying to find a nice tree to get a stick for his own wand. His search led him to the road near the entry to Privet Drive, having decided he didn't want an oak wand. His drawers were bad enough to be made from the bland wood.

Finally, after growing a bit bored, he found a tree he found suitable. It was a big pine tree planted nearly eight years ago. Unknowingly to Harry, it fell on just the edge of the wards guarding Privet Drive. Harry began gently snapping sticks off one of the low hanging branches; after cycling through the pile, he found one that fit his had relatively nice. He figured he could make it nicer once he got home, it was a bit short and thick but he could easily make it longer by elongating it.

Happy with his find, he returned home and began his work on it's design. Sitting at his desk, he laid it gently on the open workspace. Biting his lip in concentration, he willed the wood to smooth, shaping it slowly into a handle. Slowly over the hour, he managed to get a smooth, straight wand with a nice handle that he could make wider as he grew.

The next part of lengthening it took another three quarters of an hour to get it from a near five inches to a respectable ten inches. This was the reason it took his repairs so long, it was a slow going and gentle process. The one time he attempted to rush fixing his bed slates, they simply snapped and shattered in the concentrated area. He was slowly but surely speeding up the process from sheer practice and knowledge of the woods, but he wanted to be careful with his wand. Every couple of centimetres he lengthened, he'd gently alter it until it smoothly flowed with the already finished pine.

Now with the shell made, Harry paused. What was it his aunt said made a wand again? Wood, and something else. Something had to be inside it. Unicorn something? She mentioned his mother having a wand with a unicorn something in it.

"Hoof? Heart? No..." He muttered to himself. "It was a 'H'... Oh, the mane! Hair!"

Grunting, he yanked a long hair out of his head and laid it neatly beside the wand.

"Now how do I get it inside?... Where's that thingy for wool, the needle."

Eyes furrowed, now biting the inside of his mouth, he hesitantly brought the wand closer in one hand to the long silver needle in the other.

Without warning, his door was thrust open.

"Dinner is re-"

"GAH!"

The bang had startled the eight year old into thrusting the needle into the top of his fingers. Whimpering, he removed it, blood dribbling onto his desk, matting the hair.

"What are you doing?!" Aunt Petunia squealed, rushing forward to examine his hand.

"Making a wand." Harry answered innocently, letting out a small noise as his three fingers that were pierced stung.

Glaring at them, forgetting Aunt Petunia's presence, he willed the pinpoint stabs to heal over. His aunt gasped as the skin knit itself over, good as knew.

Realising his mistake, Harry looked up, panicking.

"I'm sorry I'm sorry I'm sorry-"

"No, no. It's fine." Petunia gasped, swallowing. "Just... clean up and come downstairs. You can finish your wand after."

Petunia decided to not actually tell Harry that wands are sold in the Freak World, preferring to let him do as he wanted. He'd find out himself it didn't work.

While Harry ate downstairs with his relatives, the blood he spilled dried over his single hair.

Full of fish and chips, Harry returned to work. Slowly piercing the wood with the silver needle and aided by his magic, he cleanly made a thin hole for about three thirds the length. Ignoring the specks of blood, he gently poked the hair into the slot burrowed with the needle. Slowly pushing it along, he finally got the whole hair inside. Now he had a core!

Willing the wood to seal over, he watched as the small entry melted into smooth grain over the course of the next few minutes, blending seamlessly with the rest of the wood. He now had a fully functional wand! Pleased with his work, Harry paused. How do you even use a wand?

Harry picked up, nearly dropping it as it spluttered deep red and green sparks before heating in his hand. It felt like he was being hugged (though he was guessing, having never had one), in his hand. What a strange sensation.

Shrugging, he pointed it loosely at his desk.

And realised he had no idea how to use it. He didn't know any magical incantations, so what could he do? Make his own?

That wouldn't seem very safe, nor easy. Instead, he tried focusing on the concept of cleaning. The hard work that went into wiping down a surface, the ache in the elbows, wrist and back, and the end result, a glistening surface.

Without warning, the wand tip flashed white for the briefest of moments, the light enveloping the desk. Once he could see again, Harry saw the surfaces that looked as if they were just freshly polished and scrubbed down.

Jaw hanging, Harry stared at the result. That would have took him ages to do without a wand! Sweet!

Giggling madly, he started cleaning every inch of his room. No more chores! Pausing in his pursuit of the thing beside godliness, Harry scolded himself. He had magic, and he only used it for making things float, repairing, a touch of building and now cleaning! Well, and fusing, he supposed. But still! Now, the question was, what could he do with a magic wand?


	3. The Fall

**Chapter Three: The Fall.**

* * *

 _Life,_ a nine year old Harry Potter reflected, _takes as much as it gives._

Now that he had no Dudley to worry about, life at school was better. Sure he didn't have any friends, having all possibilities already chased away but he was content to simply do his own thing. When he wasn't doing schoolwork, he designing furniture, or doodling ideas for things to try with magic. He was far more interested in his own pursuits than making friends with people at his primary.

Nothing magical has happened in two years beyond anything he's wanted to happen, so Aunt Petunia and Uncle Vernon were pleased with him. Not pleased enough to be friendly or familial, but cordial. In a way, it hurt more than being ignored or resented.

His aunt was always confused whenever she saw his wand, but he didn't really care. As long as he kept himself to himself he was left alone to his own devices. He had realised what his Aunt was doing with giving him an allowance and his relatives distancing from him.

It hurt to realise that, even when he was being good, they'd never love him. She was easing him into independence to minimise how much contact he had with them, and this wasn't something he could stand up to. You can't force someone to care about you, or love you. And so instead of continuing to mope (for he had indeed wallowed in self-pity in his room for days after his epiphany) he worked on accepting it and, in an angry effort to convince himself he didn't need them, embrace it.

It hurt, so much, that she had given him hope, only to destroy it.

Now that he had a wand, he found that magic performed was much easier and faster to do. Work that took him a week of nights to do now could be done in one, but he was worried about possible breakage or no access to his wand, if it was took off him for punishment for example. As a result of that worry, he did the work with the wand, but also worked on replicating the effects without it too. So far he had only worked with repairing and creating furniture, and the most beyond that were screws, though only with bought in products. His pine desk was actually one hundred percent pine, with no need for screws as they were seamlessly blended together with magic.

Now, however, he felt confident to attempt to work with metals and plastics (after the explosive result of the bed slates, he was wary around potentially lethal shards) to repair toys or ornaments, or even make his own, for himself! Dudley had plenty for him to work with, some of the broken toys had been left while Dudley took what he "needed". Taking a ruined air-rifle out of the wardrobe gingerly, he laid it on his desk.

Using his wand, he gently eased the barrel of the bent gun back into it's former straight form. It took some tries to straighten it properly as he overshot it a few times, but eventually it looked fixed to Harry. wheezing as he struggled to lift it (even with a proper diet now, Harry remained thin, though was now a reasonable height) and aim it out the window.

It took some effort to successfully load the but gun Harry eventually had it pointed in the direction of the tree in the back garden. Squeezing the trigger, Harry let out a yelp of surprise as it bucked against his shoulder, falling flat on his rump while the offending rifle clattered to the floor.

Adjusting his glasses, he peered out into the garden. The tree was now scarred, a clear gouge mark visible in it's mighty trunk.

That was a relief for Harry. Now confident that metal wasn't suddenly going to explode on him, he turned his wand on the broken television.

When Petunia rushed upstairs at the sound of a loud explosion fearing the worst for Dudley, she was instead greeted by the sight of an open door to her nephew's room, with said boy's face covered in soot, hair somehow even more of a mess and broken glasses framing a pair of wide and baffled green eyes. She was torn between slight concern and relief that Dudley was not hurt, it was his tenth birthday tomorrow after all.

Harry learned his lesson that night to not mess around with electronics and magic, faintly ringing ears a phantom reminder. His Aunt had told him irritatedly that he'd have to wait until Monday before he could get new glasses, as it was currently Friday night. On a rather admittedly not very bright side, Harry discovered that plastic was also not malleable by his magic (it could not be altered, though could be damaged or levitated), though the lenses strangely were also not and that came as a surprise. Harry didn't understand why this was. Perhaps because he didn't know how lenses were actually made? But he didn't exactly know how an air-rifle was made either. Maybe if it was due to it just being the barrel he had tried to fix?

He really needed some way to write his observations down. He'd look into getting a notebook or something on the next run to the charity stores.

With all his focus on his magical activities, Harry had completely forgotten a dreaded occasion occurring tomorrow. Aunt Marge was coming to stay the weekend for Dudley's birthday. Therefore, it was a rather horrifying experience to walk downstairs the next morning to be greeted by a red faced Vernon huffing as he brought in the identifying black suitcase, closely followed by the awful woman herself.

Before Harry could properly comprehend how much of a horrible turn his weekend had took, Marge thrust her umbrella in his direction. Of course without his glasses, he barely caught it and it resulted in a very sore nose.

Snorting, she walked imperiously into the living room to greet Petunia and Dudley. Vernon however, paused.

"I want you to go and clean up your room." He muttered. "Anything obviously... You know what, hide it; get it out of sight."

Harry nodded uncertainly, there were only a few things needing hidden. His current project for one, a wooden chess set he was carving before the incident with the television, and of course his wand. He wouldn't put it past the evil woman to destroy it if she knew it had the tiniest of importance to him. He was going to keep that hidden on him up his sleeve, as it was best protected by being on his person.

"Take Marge's suitcase and 'brolly up with you." His uncle grunted, before going to the kitchen, presumably to put on the kettle.

Wheezing and huffing all the way, Harry eventually got the cumbersome case into the guest room, before returning downstairs to make the second trip with the umbrella.

"Still got the stray I see, Vernon." Came from the living room, Marge's loud sneering tone easily heard.

Uncle Vernon said something back Harry didn't quite hear, he was too busy holding his temper in. Realising no question had been asked and he needn't respond to the woman, he instead choose to grab the umbrella and make a fast return journey to the guest room.

Sighing, he decided the best course of action would be hiding in his room for as long as he could to avoid her.

* * *

When dinner rolled round Harry was conscripted to handle drinks for his relatives (Aunt Petunia had discreetly told him she'd save some for him to have in his room later), what followed was an increasingly uncomfortable experience for all present aside from an oblivious Marjorie Dursley and Dudley who was far more concerned with his brand new Monster Truck toy, which was currently doing laps around the sofas.

What made the atmosphere rather tense was the conversation topics, for Marge was currently tipsy and was ranting about one of her common pet peeves in the Dursley Household; Harry and his parents.

"Honestly, dumped on your doorstep! You'd think people know what days to put their trash out!" This particularly witty one by her in Harry's opinion (by Marge's standards anyway) had the woman roaring her laughter at her own cleverness.

"Come here boy, I need another brandy!"

Grimacing, Harry took the bottle off the kitchen counter, carefully carrying it to the table. Marge always sent him back with the bottle to the kitchen rather than leave it at the table because that meant she'd be pouring her own drinks, and much preferred ordering her brother's nephew-in-law to do it for her. She didn't see herself as petty, merely seeing to it the boy knew his place: at their beck and call.

Only, Harry had a stroke of horribly bad luck on this short trip. Ripper, Marge's favourite bulldog, was planning on mooching some of the alcohol off his owner and had positioned himself lying in front of Marge's chair. Harry did not have his glasses, and as such did not notice the obstacle in his path. What resulted can only be summarised as a clusterfuck.

Harry stepped on Ripper's tail, causing the dog to let out a yelp as pain shot through it, the beast darting away. Harry tripped on the animal as a result, the brandy bottle was then sent flying on a crash course for Marge, whom had her glass ready. The bottle collided with the glass in her hand shattering both, raining his Aunt with glass chards and the red liquid. Harry's fall led him into Marge, sending them both off her chair to the floor.

At the end of it all, it left a moaning and screaming Marge covered in stains of red both alcoholic and bloody, an angry Ripper then realised who exactly hurt him and his owner, and a dazed young Harry.

The three Dursley inhabitants could only watch open mouthed as Harry managed to make out what exactly was staring at him with dilated eyes, and proceeded to bolt for the garden, the dog hot on his heels.

Petunia rushed to the kitchen for the first aid box, Vernon went to look over and help up his sister and Dudley sat, not knowing what to do. Eventually, his brain defaulted to resuming eating.

Harry however, had a time-frame of zero seconds to work out where he could find safety from his pursuer. He went for the first thing that came to both his mind and his blurry sight; the tree.

Harry was stuck up the tree for three hours until midnight as they had had a particularly late dinner at nine at night.

In that space of time, Vernon had took Marge to hospital, Dudley was still playing with his new toys, and Petunia had cleaned up the mess of the dining area, alternating between watching anxiously the bulldog that intimidated her and watching her television soaps.

Ripper was still out for blood. So when he heard his target make noise, he bolted into the garden, barking furiously.

Harry had been high up in the tree, near the second floor of the house. For three hours he sat in fear as it rained, shivering and petrified. He hated his relatives. They treated him normally, but gave him false hope of him being normal in their eyes, a family member. Then they leave him out here in the cold and the dark, unable to return without having his throat ripped out. He hated them. He wished he could hurt them, somehow, but he was too weak. He couldn't even handle the stupid dog of Marge's! Tears soon joined the rain.

He had been in the process of carefully stepping down to the lower branch which he had levitated slightly with his wand when he heard Ripper come into the garden.

Instantly freezing in fear, his footing slipped and met air, and his careful progress down turned into a free-fall to the earth, screaming on the way. His wand slipped out his right hand, and all Harry could think about was he was going to die and his aunt would continue watching television, only to find him later being eaten by Marge's mutt.


	4. The Truth

**Chapter Four: The Truth.**

* * *

Pain erupted in Harry's head and back before the world went black. He was still aware of his nerves which felt as if they were on fire, but in the distance he could see light. A bright white expanse.

Ripper was going to be on him in any second, he was scared, very scared of being ripped apart by the vicious dog, but the white was getting closer, getting brighter.

 _"Hey. You're not quite gone, are you?"_

There was a figure, sitting there without a care in the world.

 _"No, you're not. You should be, but you're not. Looks like I'm being cheated again!"_ It laughed. How could anyone be cheerful right now? He was in so much pain, it hurts everywhere now!

 _"Clever she was... But what's this? He's back again. Back and not back. I seeee you!~"_ It's voice sent shivers that he couldn't properly feel through him.

It wasn't making sense, why wasn't it helping him?!

 _"How did he get here? Oh, he's not? Haha! Look's like he didn't escape with everything after all! But it has to go back. It's time shall come."_

Somehow, more pain erupted. crawling up his spine, to his head, before flowing down to his forehead. Harry screamed, but no sound came out. He felt as if a part of his insides was being torn out, the pain was unbelievable.

He tried to sob, but he couldn't move, it was all white.

 _"Gone."_ The pain eased.

 _"But payment is due. So fascinating, it extends to here... You're in Limbo aren't you?"_ The being tilted it's head.

Harry started to feel cold, as if water was gently leaving through his skin. The pain flowed away.

 _"The price is paid, and the promise fulfilled, in it's fashion."_

The light was fading, but the figure wasn't. Now that Harry could focus on what was disappearing, he could make out the faceless grin.

 _"But she overpaid."_

The light rushed forward like the a speeding car's headlights, and Harry was blinded, coming face to faceless.

 _"I got all of her, but not all of him."_ It whispered. _"She has paid, and so shall you, in the end."_

He was terrified now.

 _"It's only equivalent that I share the Truth with you, to compensate."_ The grin returned.

"What truth?!" Harry shouted, struck now by the realisation he could speak.

 _"Of everything."_

The gate he'd mistaken for a mural opened, it's symbols glistening in the white. The darkness erupted into a single eye reflecting his image in it's great pupil, three times his height. When did it end up behind him?!

 _"Look into the abyss child."_

He stared.

And it stared back.

He backed away, slowly, still gazing.

The figure laughed.

Hands reached on black tendrils, grabbing onto Harry, and still he gazed.

It dragged him closer, closer.

Harry turned back to the figure, eyes wide with fear and panicking.

 _"Isn't it what you wanted?"_

"NO!"

The grin fell into a smile.

 _"Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you. You asked. You looked. You knocked. The door has opened, child."_

Harry was dragged into the darkness, falling through everything and nothing. The door closed behind him.

 _"You could be great you know!"_

"No, no...Please!" Harry sobbed.

 _"You **will** be great!"_

Falling, as streamers of images like camera rolls flowed past him as he understood everything, saw everything and he could not close his eyes to it.

"I DON'T WANT TO BE GREAT!" he screamed out.

The images didn't stop, the pain didn't lessen, and he spiralled down further, deeper.

"MAKE IT STOP, PLEASE!"

Harry was suddenly shot up in less than a second. He was back in front of the gate, now closed. But he still knew what lay behind it's sinisterness. He had stared at himself.

 _"Will you wield greatness gently?"_

When he blinked, he was back. Cold, hard earth clung to his back.


	5. The Magic

**Chapter Five: The Magic.**

* * *

The pain was gone (aside from a pounding headache), but his other senses were still active when Harry came to. Rain was still heavily falling, his skin was cold as water ran off and mud clung to it . His head hurt, though. He knew so much knowledge, so much about his magic and what he was doing, what he could be doing with it. That, _thing,_ he had saw, though... It terrified him. To have his hatred and resentment towards his relatives so laid bare back to him by another, but it was worse, far worse. He'd been shown the Truth, and he knew oh so many ways he could exact revenge on his relatives, from petty to bloody. He needed his room, he needed to get out of the cold.

Sitting up, he panicked, remembering he'd fallen with his wand. Had he landed on it?! Eyes darting back and forth in the space around him, Harry found it lying innocently in the wet dirt much to his relief.

Picking it up, he felt a renewed sense of warmth run to his fingertips moving on throughout his body. It was different to when he'd first held it, now his wand felt more... _Alive_.

It was special to him, he never felt more proud than now about his creation. Harry's good mood plummeted suddenly in a parody of his recent fall at the sound of growling.

Ripper was eyeing him from the doors. He'd have no time to escape to the tree now. Without warning, Ripper broke into a run for him, eager to rip into his flesh in vengeance.

There was nothing he could do, nothing he could use his magic on to save him, not enough time. Whimpering, he tucked himself into a ball tighter, subconsciously bringing his wand to his chest for the feeling of comfort. He closed his eyes.

Ripper's barking was feet away, before it ceased. The wind had picked up harshly in that moment, before an _umph_ noise sounded, followed by high pitched whining. When a splat sounded, Harry opened one eye against his better judgement.

The blur that was Ripper was back near the doors, looking thoroughly terrified. He limped on his front paw, still whining as he retreated into the house.

Harry was very confused. The dog hadn't simply gave up on him when it was in full run, no. It sounded as if it had been lifted and _thrown_ across the garden.

"Is-is someone there?" He whispered, feeling rather stupid. Surely he would have heard them?

After a beat of silence, he felt his body slowly heat up to combat the cold rain still falling. What was heating him up? It wasn't his wand, it felt different. This warmth was gentle, comforting. He nearly let out a sob as he realised, it felt like what he imagined a hug would be like. As if in response, the warmth pulled him tighter, dancing across his skin.

"What are you?" Harry asked, eyes full of wonder.

The heat travelled up to his face, before settling on his eyes. When they slowly got warmer and slightly itchy, Harry screwed them shut. After a moment, the feeling subsided, but did not disappear, and he opened his eyes.

Light, pure and radiating, was crawling across his skin like the vines of a plant. Wrapping and constricting his being, yet never directly pressuring him, simply caressing. Tendrils of it hovered absentmindedly around his person. Some stretching out, exploring the garden.

It was beautiful. He could see it around the corner of his eyes like the rims of his glasses, the loving energy gleefully showing itself to him. He could see with perfect clarity like this.

Harry eventually tore his gaze from the spectacle surrounding him skyward, as the rain got heavier. In response, the tendrils previously hovering around without purpose split, thickening and flattening to cover the top, somehow manifesting physically and blocking the rainfall.

"Thank you." He whispered.

It surged through his being in response. A gentle, protective loving feeling in it's simplest form. For once, Harry knew what it felt like to be loved.

He didn't fully understand what the force around him was, or better yet why it was present. It wasn't there before, as far as he knew. It seemed to originate from him though, yet remained invisible to the naked eye.

Finally getting to his feet, Harry made for the doors to the house. Ripper, seeing Harry on the move in his direction, promptly fled.

When he was about to put his hand on the handle, Harry paused. He needed to clean himself up before his Aunt went into rant about him bringing mud into her home. He bottled the surge of anger firmly. It didn't matter that his loving aunt valued her house's cleanliness over his well-being.

He could hurt them. Cause them to suffer like he did. His uncle's venomous words, the torment from Dudley, and his sweet Aunts cooking lessons. The first time he made bacon he burned it, and Petunia in a fit of anger as that was the last few slices for Vernon, took Harry's hand and thrust it onto the stove for a second.

The burn had healed somehow (now he knew magically) overnight, but the pain and the fear and the sensation of your skin bubbling like the oil in the pan was not something so easily forgotten.

 _"Will you wield greatness gently?"_

Those words still rang in his head, however. Just because he _could_ make them suffer, doesn't mean he _should._ It was that logic if being more powerful that had led them to hurt him, and Harry refused to have his relatives as role models.

He wasn't a bully.

Though that did not mean he was going to make their life any easier.

"Back in, are you?" Petunia barked without looking away from her programme when she heard the garden solar door open. Looks like the mud will be a nasty surprise for her later.

"Yes. I'm going to bed."

"You do that." Came the flippant reply. "Vernon will have words with you tomorrow."

Wincing at the reminder of the events earlier, Harry wordlessly continued to his room.

"Dad's going to rip into you tomorrow." Dudley chortled from his doorway when he heard Harry open his room door.

"Accidents happen." Harry replied, smirking to himself at the double meaning.

Dudley glowered at him before remembering the potentially lethal ability Harry possessed, and quickly retreated to his bedroom's safety.

Lying on his bed, Harry contemplated the knowledge that had been forced upon him. The headache was subsiding, but the mental pain of the sudden influx of knowledge remained.

He knew so much without learning about it, it was all instinctual. Physics, Chemistry, Biology... Harry fully understood what made up his desk, and using energy from the earth he could touch it and change it's very matter.

It wasn't quite magic, he understood. This power came from the earth, not the channels of ambient magic running through it and pouring forth into the very air. This invisible force around him...

Harry hypothesised (what a big word he learned, for it wasn't simply in science and energy he'd gained knowledge) that this force was a physical manifestation of the magic of his body. He came to this conclusion after examining his wand and furniture.

He hadn't really noticed until he had something for comparison, but the magic seemed to have some colour them. The tendrils were like a camp-fire, blazing gently between red, yellow and orange. In contrast, his wand was a rather unique purple and dark red. His desk however, was a dulled brown. However it was not as bright as the tendrils or his wand, it was brighter than his other furniture. There was less brown in the others, which he guessed was due to less magic being used to actually repair them. His desk was made from the wood with magic. Eventually his eyes started acting up, tears prickling as the burn from the beginning slowly returned. The energy around his eyes promptly bled away at his discomfort, returning his vision to it's normal short sightedness and colour spectrum. It seems like he'd have the same issue when he started willingly using magic through his hands, when he was accidentally burning them.

It seemed that one's body worked like a battery. Magic filled it over time, and using a conduit (be it a hand, eye, wand or a staff like those old story images Harry remembered) it released the built magic into a force fuelled by... He wasn't quite sure about this part. Whenever he wanted something to repair, he'd just focused on that phrase.

Perhaps it was the phrase? Like an incantation? No, it couldn't be. He'd never uttered an incantation when he'd teleported to the school roof. Willpower, perhaps? He'd have to look into what the hidden community thought about how magic was performed.

So the body worked as a battery, and then used some of the magic to perform what it wanted. It then recharged overtime. He'd performed magic nightly, perhaps it was the time of sleep that allowed it? Rest? No. He'd never had to sleep very long before. He was asleep late and up early while still feeling refreshed. Perhaps it was just the time frame.

All this new knowledge however, was nearly all non-magical. It was an application of rules and laws to change nature using tectonic energy, that much he knew instinctively. Magic wasn't that.

Soon enough Harry was too tired to bother trying anything be it magical, or... He really needed a name for this. He'd go down to the library tomorrow and see if he could find something.


	6. The Answer

**Chapter Six: The Answer.**

* * *

 _Life,_ a ten year old Harry reflected, _had gotten... Complicated._

That weekend Marge had ended up being released from hospital on Sunday night, and Uncle Vernon had took her still packed luggage to the hospital and drove her home.

When he returned, Harry's uncle first tried to figure out a suitable punishment. Denying food was not allowed, his wife had told him. He couldn't very well lock him in the cupboard as was done before. Finally, he came to a solution.

Locks were put in place on the outside of Harry's door, which Vernon explained was the first part of his punishment. From the coming Monday to the next Sunday, he'd be locked in unless for meals or the bathroom after school.

His monthly allowance, however, was the main part of the punishment. It was permanently cut in half to fifteen pounds a month, and this month's allowance was denied.

Harry had been very annoyed at this, as he'd been planning to try out some of the things he'd learned. Namely, if he actually understood books on the sciences and matter from the knowledge he, for a lack of a better explanation, assimilated. The isolation punishment also denied him the chance to research what exactly his new ability was, though he wasn't sure if he could find it in an ordinary library. It was most likely a magically related ability, but then again, magic was in fairy tales Harry rationalised. He could possibly find references in storybooks or historical books.

The upside of his new ability however, was something he hadn't actually considered at first. Now he could alter Dudley's castoffs to his size, and what a comfort that was. Now he could take some pride in his appearance, something the Dursleys hadn't particularly cared about for him.

His Magic had seemed to be changed as well. It was far more reactive, as he was now aware of the tendrils of energy seemed happy to remind him of their presence. He was pretty sure this wasn't the case before, as he could now do what previously took a nights work (though shortened to an hour through pure nightly exercise) in seconds. The ambient tendrils made contact and the effect occurred in an instance. However, the magic tended to be on the overeager side of things. When he'd gotten frustrated with the locks on the doors on Wednesday, the day he was supposed to be going to the zoo, it _disintegrated_ the whole door into sawdust and metal strips.

Vernon decided against trying again with the locks, but still enforced the grounding. His door was bought the next day.

Touch magic worked the same he was sure though he now found himself subconsciously using his new ability to do that job, signalled by the electrified coloured sparks.

All Harry had to do was clap his hands, touch his target with both, then the black-white-red energy crackles, and the change occurs. The benefits were simply amazing. For one, the drain was unnoticeable, unlike when he tried using his magic. He couldn't overpower or under power the effect either, it just happened.

On the first of July when he was released from his prison, Harry went to the library.

Nothing. Basically nothing was referenced in any of the non-fiction books or fairy tales about his ability. Frustrated, Harry tried to think of a different approach. Eventually, it clicked. How do you describe a word you do not know? You use other words, these words together make the word you wanted! For example, 'visualise'; it's an _image_ you create _mentally_ and using that you search for the word.

So first Harry considered what it was he was actually doing. He was creating a nuclear reaction, which is a form of Nuclear Chemistry. Searching this up he came with Nuclear Transmutation.

Transmutation was the clear word here, and another search of this led him to his answer. The act of changing state. Something which was known in the non-magical world as an early science and spoken as a shady area. Alchemy.

It all added up. From some quick research, Harry discovered Alchemy's founding coincided with metallurgy, a domain that studies the physical and chemical behaviour of metallic elements. For gods sake it was an alchemist's term! When non-magicals started developing sciences and engineering, they both were influenced by and inspired magicals! Every story and legend has, however little, some basis of truth to what led to it's telling. The Philosophers Stone spoken about _was_ the fairy tale story in the non-magical world Harry was looking for. Alchemy's end goal being a Philosophers Stone, the key to eternal life, made it clear it was a magical artefact. During such a time period where the barriers between magicals and non-magicals were low, the bleed in both culture and knowledge was inevitable. Alchemy was also early potioneering, which in turn led non-magicals into exploring health and medicine.

The reason that why non-magicals could not perform Alchemy was simple: it was a magical ability. It required magic to make the connection to the earth to perform. Hence why many of the attempts by those without magic failed, and led it to being told as false.

Harry could also guess that Alchemy was most likely a rare dying art in the magical world, too. If everybody had the ability to turn graphite into diamonds...

It also corresponded with the knowledge Harry had assimilated, too. Chemistry, Physics, Biology, they all had roots in Alchemy.

Now knowing what it was he was doing, and given several fields of study to learn, Harry was determined to learn what his limits where, and in doing so, find out what he was capable of with it. Not for _greatness_ or glory, but for the betterment of himself and others.


	7. The Alley

**Chapter Seven: The Alley.**

* * *

On his tenth birthday, Harry was asked by Petunia if he wanted something to commemorate the occasion. Of course, she didn't say it as polite or with as many words. When he'd came down for breakfast that day (Dudley and Vernon were still in bed) she snapped without looking from frying the bacon.

"What do you want today?"

Surprised that he was actually getting something, though the within reason (not worth more than five pounds or something Dudley would want) he took a moment to reply.

"Where do you go for the magic stuff?" He asked instead of answering.

"London. A little pub."

"Then I'd like a lift there."

Petunia's lips pursed. Her husband did have the week off, so she could say that they could go into London for the day and drop the boy there. Then they could pick him up later, with neither Dudley or Vernon needing to be bothered about freakishness.

"Very well. We'll leave at nine, and pick you up outside it at four." She answered, before adding with a sneer, "Be there on time or we'll leave you behind and you can walk back."

Harry nodded absent-mindedly, six hours should be enough time to explore this "Diagonally" place Petunia had mentioned in reference for magical shopping when he had asked before. Harry also planned on enquiring where exactly his parents belongings had been put into storage, too.

Breakfast had been a quiet affair, with Petunia dropping the suggestion of going to London for the day, Dudley and Vernon rapidly agreeing when she mentioned a buffet they'd visited before.

The journey was a quiet affair, with Harry reading a ragged _On A Pale Horse_ he bought in a charity store, while Dudley playing his Game-Boy. Petunia and Vernon were quietly talking about something or another, Harry wasn't playing them much attention.

His first stop would be finding the banking company his parents had been with. After that, he'd need buy a bag or something for school that he could keep his purchases in.

Harry didn't really want to make any plans beyond, as he didn't have much of an idea of what to expect. Getting information from Petunia about the magical community had always been like pulling teeth, and he was surprised at the meagre information he did have. Apparently, they dressed weird, had broomsticks that can _fly_ (apparently his father had told Petunia about this when his parents met Vernon and Petunia for dinner once) and a few more minor details.

Soon enough once they were into the deep of London the car was slowing to a halt. Glancing out the window Harry saw they were indeed in Charing Cross. He followed Petunia's line of sight to an innocuous row of stores. One stood out in particular, with it's hanging sign of what looked like a witch brewing.

"You should be able to find it yourself," Petunia sniffed, "normal people can't see it."

Quickly stuffing his book into his rucksack, Harry was eager to leave the car. As soon as the door closed, Vernon revved the engine, startling Harry.

He was pretty sure Dudley was howling in the back-seat as they sped off.

"Lovely." Harry muttered dryly to himself.

Opening the top zip, he did a quick check to make sure nothing was left behind in his haste. If something was, it would be gone forever.

His wallet was there, stuffed with wads of saved notes. A small A5 notebook with several pens too beside his book and of course, his trusty wand. He took that out and stowed it in his trousers. He'd kept Dudley's as they had deep pockets but used his Alchemy to shorten the bottom of the legs so they fit him. With a belt, they fit him comfortably and served to hide his wand too.

Now assured he hadn't lost anything, Harry walked to the heavy wooden door leading into the pub with the witch-sign.

He had seemed to choose a good time, it was nearly empty at this time of the morning. The bartender was chatting with a huge man at the counter top while two women were gossiping near the back. He wasn't spared a second glance from the balding bartender.

Confused as to where exactly go, Harry stood awkwardly around. When the two women stood to leave, only not through the way Harry entered, he followed.

They walked out to the back, still chatting away oblivious to their tail, and one of them took out a short thin object he recognised as a wand.

 _Not as good as mine, of course,_ Harry thought to himself when palming his pocket.

To his amazement, the witch tapped a seemingly order of the bricks on the wall, and it began to collapse and reorganise itself to form an archway.

It took a few moments for Harry to compose himself at the _magical_ (no pun intended) sight.

Colourful shops lined either side, with patrons flowing through the wide street in a chorus of noise, chatter and laughter as they went about their business. Stalls displayed strange items such as quills and what looked like amulets. He was trying to keep track of the tendrils curiously exploring the new, glowing (at least to his eyes) magical objects. He really hoped the grumpy looking wizard didn't notice the slightly swinging medallion that one was excitedly playing with.

At the end of the street towered a large marble building. It had a round carved front, which on it Harry could make out the word 'bank' even from this far away. Though, to be honest he needn't have deduced it by words; only bankers or royalty would be housed in such an obnoxiously wealthy structure.

Making his way through the pandemonium trying to avoid getting distracted at the various bizarre happenings and displays (was that an owl?) and keeping the magical tendrils close to his person, he eventually reached the marble monstrosity's grand steps. He could now make out the full sign: Gringotts Wizarding Bank.

A little creature with a rather large spear stood off from the bronze doors. It took the rest of Harry's willpower to not stare, as he guessed it wouldn't like him doing that. After heaving open the doors, Harry still ignoring the now smirking creature, two more flanked a pair of silver doors. These ones, however, had a rhyme carved into them:

' _Enter, stranger, but take heed_

 _Of what awaits the sin of greed,_

 _For those who take, but do not earn,_

 _Must pay most dearly in their turn._

 _So if you seek beneath our floors_

 _A treasure that was never yours,_

 _Thief, you have been warned, beware_

 _Of finding more than treasure there._ '

"Cute." Harry muttered to himself dryly, swallowing back his nervousness.

Through those doors, was a vast marble hall with long counters stretching along its length with doors leading off to who knows where. More of the little creatures sat at these counters organised by what they were doing Harry guessed, as some on the left where all using various measuring instruments and magnifying glasses to examine and document in ledgers information about the precious gems they were studying. To the right, most were using quills to fill in various documents. After that, there were the creatures interacting with customers; this was mirrored to the left side.

It was clear now that these little creatures and humans were alike; Harry could now see they sported hairstyles not previously seen through the metal helms the guards adorned, ranging from wavy white to extravagant beards. Harry guessed there was a uniform code for the entry guards.

Making a quick decision, he darted into a queue consisting of one impatient man fiddling with a satchel.

"Yes?" The being grunted in it's guttural male voice once the man walked away.

Harry stepped forward anxiously.

"What do you want, child?" He asked without looking up as it went to sign a small form.

"I'd, er, like to see my account."

The being paused, before finishing with an elegant twist.

"Your... _account_." It seemed to test the word. "Perhaps you mean, your vault?"

Vault? This bank was serious business. Then again, it was silly to presume electronics; Harry still remembered the Television Incident.

"I, yes. I'd like to see my vault."

"I see. Your name?"

"Harry Potter." He answered, fiddling with his backpack strap.

It looked at him funnily. "Harry... Potter. Hm." It fiddled with several tomes under it's desk, before pulling out a large ledger with a grunt.

Flicking through it leisurely while Harry fidgeted nervously, it eventually stopped near the halfway mark.

"Potter, I see." He murmured, reading information in a language Harry did not recognise. "And do you have your key, Mr Potter?"

"My key?" Harry repeated, flummoxed.

"Yes." The creature's smile was all teeth. "Your key."

"...No?"

"Well, this is rather... unfortunate. For if you don't have your key, 'Mr Potter', how do we know you are Mr Potter?"

Harry's eyes narrowed. "What is the procedure for if a key is lost?"

"Have you lost your key?"

"That's not what I asked, mister..."

"Tongdak, 'Mr Potter'." Came the drawl reply.

"Mister Tongdak, I am asking what other methods of identification there are." Harry stated firmly, beginning to get irritated.

"Well, usually our clients have their keys." The creature paused to savour Harry's annoyed expression. "Some methods of truth forcing and verification are blocked by your Ministry of Magic, such as veritaserum or magical contracts..."

Harry had no clue what either of those were, but chose not to interrupt, knowing the annoying thing would be difficult if he did so.

"... But there are still a few alternates. Essence of Downfall, for one."

"May I try that route then?" Harry questioned.

"Of course, for the small price of five galleons."

Galleons? What's a galleon?

"Galleons are our currency." Tongdak answered after Harry voiced his thoughts. "One sickle is twenty nine knuts, one Galleon is seventeen sickles."

Harry raised an eyebrow. "Why are the exchanges like that?"

"Because goblins count in prime numbers." Came the short reply.

Five galleons though...

"How much is one galleon worth?" Harry asked.

"A galleon, seventeen Sickles, and four hundred and ninety three Knuts."

Harry pinched the bridge of his nose, breathing deeply.

"In, non-magical money." He said after exhaling.

"Only four pounds, ninety nine pence."

Harry couldn't speak for a moment.

"You're charging me basically twenty five pounds, just to identify myself?"

"You shouldn't have lost your key then, 'Mr Potter.' That is it's own replacement cost too."

"I never had a key!"

"...And this is the fault of Gringotts, how? It was in your parents possession."

Ignoring what would have been a seriously aggravating line of conversation, Harry went back to trying to get access to his own Vault.

"What are the-... Are there any cheaper alternatives to the Essence Of Downfall?"

The goblin grinned. "Why, a Vault Key of course."

Harry took a moment to keep himself from crying out of sheer frustration.

"Fine, Fine! I'll take the Essence!"

"One moment while I check if we have it in stock." Tongdak smiled sweetly (for a being with a wide mouth, a terrifying sight) in reply, before shouting in a language composed of snarls and harsh rasping among other unpleasant sounds to another goblin, whom shouted to another.

"We have some in stock, please wait while it is fetched."

the wait lasted for a few minutes, Harry simmering over the loss of nearly twenty five pounds to just get access to his vault. Tongdak looked as if he hadn't a care in the world.

Eventually a panting goblin ran over on little legs, handing a thin glass bottle to Tongdak, whom said something in reply, presumably thanking him.

"Please drink this 'Mr Potter.'"

Gritting his teeth at the sarcastic emphasis on his name, Harry took the bottle roughly from the goblin's grip. Before uncorking it, he paused.

"Is there anything I could be allergic to in this?" He asked cautiously.

"How should I know?" Came the snide reply. "Though if you do turn out to be, Gringotts takes no responsibility. Also, five galleons, please."

"I will give it to you from my vault once I prove who I am." Harry hissed.

"That cannot be done. What if you're not Harry Potter?"

"Fine, I'll give you twenty the four pounds and ninety five pence." Harry said, moving to open his bag.

"Galleons, not muggle money." The goblin sighed. "You'll have to exchange it."

"And how do I do that?"

"Down three desks. I shall keep the bottle here."

The good thing about having to go through the process of getting his money exchanged meant Harry could calm down slightly. A couple of minutes later, he was back at Tongdak who was blessedly free.

Quickly handing over the galleons, Harry downed the bottle in one.

After feeling like static was coursing through his blood down to his toes, Harry was rather worried. After a moment, it stopped.

"Hmmm... So, you have not altered your appearance by means of disguise like Glamours or Polyjuice. Any spells or curses would've been purged." Tongdak eventually said.

"Right, now can I get access to my vault?"

"Of course not."

Harry whimpered, pulling at his hair. His eyes were heating slightly and he could see the tendrils hovering very close to the goblin's neck. Sharp tendrils, that looked quite like the spears the guards had. He internally begged his Magic off from turning the creature into a pincushion, which it did so reluctantly.

"...Why not?"

"Because we don't know what Harry Potter looks like." Came the snarky answer.

"He looks like me, because he is me! I am Harry Potter!"

"Well you do have the scar-"

"Yes I do!" Harry agreed, delighted.

"Buuuut, that could have came from anything. We don't know if that is _the_ scar."

"You told me the Essence Of Downfall would identify me as Harry Potter!"

"No, I told you it's a method of identification. It is generally used when Gringotts is suspicious of a clients identity and/or if they're under the influence of another, and they are forced to take it. Of course, the client can request it as a show of goodwill, since this way is voluntary and with a charge."

That wily no good snot-coloured gremlin.

"Then how can I identify myself as Harry Potter- And don't you say 'Vault Key'!" Harry demanded, snarling the last part when the gremlin went to speak.

Tongdak pursed his lips, making Harry cheer internally. Small victories.

"Willingly given blood could identify you. And we wouldn't need a contract." He said after a moment, more to himself.

"How? Give me all the details, please."

"Simple." He reached under his desk, pulling out a black feathered quill. A quill. Dear god, pens and pencils weren't electronic, what's the aversion to them then?!

"You prick your finger on the nib, then write your full name on _this_ piece of parchment."

Tongdak has pulled out a thick sheet of parchment halfway through his sentence, laying it flat on the counter. All around the edges in what he guessed was an inch by inch space were a chain of inscribed gently glowing symbols.

"What is that?" Harry asked suspiciously, still holding the quill.

"Proprietary Parchment." He stated simply. After Harry refused to prick his finger, Tongdak sighed. "Proprietary Parchment is the specially charmed parchment for magical contracts and business signings. However since there is no proposal or agreement, this method is perfectly legal by the ministry. You write your birth name and if it is not you, the name will burn away. If it is you, it will be accepted to the parchment. Though as I said, no agreement or deal has been charmed or written in, so the blood will simply be vanished if it is your name."

"So it verifies the persons identity?"

"Precisely. Polyjuice cannot fool it, as it is your blood that is used. If the blood in your body corresponds with the blood in the St. Mungos Identity Bank, then-"

"Identity Bank?" Harry interrupted.

Tongdak sighed deeply. "The St. Mungos Identity Bank is where a small sample of every wizard in the country's blood is. By law, a child born in the United Kingdom has a blood sample placed at birth there. Every magical citizen here has a sample there that is destroyed after confirmed death. It is what All Proprietary Parchment is bound to, ensuring it is an official document, and an iron clad surety that the identity is true. Now just write on the damn parchment and stop badgering me."

Harry pricked his finger, hissing as some of the blood was sucked into the quill which glowed briefly. When he got to the 'y' in 'Harry' he started to feel a pull on the back of his hand inside the artery.

Tongdak watched closely as Harry finished quickly, dropping the quill to suck on his stinging, reddening hand, and grimaced when the name melted until the parchment was blank again.

"My apologises, Mr Potter. We had to make sure you were who you said you were. Many people would claim to be you after all."

The apology was was indeed downtrodden; clearly the gremlin was sad it's fun was over.

"Of course." Harry replied sarcastically. " _Now_ can I see my vault?"

"Of course. Griphook!"


	8. The Coat

**Chapter Eight: The Coat.**

* * *

Griphook was a lighter green coloured gremlin who was far more, well, not polite but less smarmy than Tongdak. Though this was more due to the fact he was curt, talking less than the first gremlin Harry met, though.

The suspect cart he was led to certainly didn't put him at ease, nor did the terrifying (yet strangely exhilarating) ride.

When the cart slowed to settle, Griphook wasted no time leaving it in a clearly smooth, practised motion while Harry attempted to vault it without falling.

"I was told you lost your vault key. It shall cost a fee of two galleons to replace." Came the squeaky voice.

After the infuriating exchange Harry had had with Tongdak, he had rather expected additional charges for things on the way down. When the price of five galleons had been quoted, he instead exchanged for ten. He was now down to twenty four pounds and seventeen pence in non magical money, and after the key cost, three galleons.

Deciding to not even talk to the creature lest he be subjected to even more costs or half-truths, he simply forked over the two gold coins. Frankly, he was astounded. Ten pounds to replace something he never owned? Rather cheap from what he'd seen of the goblins.

dropping the coins into a satchel, Griphook took out a small, standard looking golden key. Waddling up to the vault door with the numbers '687' carved above. He inserted the key into the lock, but instead of opening it, he used his other hand to run a single long finger in a complex pattern on the left side. Where the finger moved, inner mechanisms groaned and clicked. The keyhole flashed a deep gold, and then Griphook turned it.

Harry felt the key handed back very different from the one he had seen enter, though he was far too busy staring, open mouthed in awe, at his vault.

Ant-hills of golden galleons with mounds of silver sickles lay disorderly in the interior, with peppered piles of bronze knuts strewn haphazardly. Taking off his backpack, Harry moved the notebook, pens and book with his wallet to the smaller, front section. Now with the larger space available, he proceeded to load it from one of the galleon piles. He counted out seventy of the gold coins, (using the rough estimate of five galleons equalling twenty five pounds, he calculated he had three hundred and fifty pounds) before grabbing a few handfuls of sickles to throw in for good measure.

Griphook muttered something about "unusual designs" and "undetectable extension charms" from the doorway, getting Harry's interest.

"Undetectable Extension Charm?" He asked curiously.

Griphook paused, his already beady eyes narrowing further.

"Your bag does not have the charm woven in?" He barked.

Sensing he'd done something wrong, he quickly came up with an excuse.

"No, er, it has it's own security. Erm, nobody but me can get in it!"

It was unbelievable to him, but surprisingly, Griphook relaxed.

"Mokeskin then."

Right; So these magicals had access to Doctor Who level dimension altering abilities (frankly, Harry couldn't get his head around it. How does an energy manage to do that?) and a leather which the owner has bound to them that only they can access it, and they hadn't gotten out of control yet? He could only imagine what some homicidal maniac could do with those abilities.

They must either be really peaceful, well enforced, or just plain lazy and unimaginative.

Putting back on his now heavier backpack, Harry decided against possibly aggravating the goblin over his rather lax withdrawal bag.

Griphook tossed his Vault Key to Harry when he was adjusting the straps, waddling away without turning back. It was only a lucky grab for the air that made it so Harry wouldn't fumble foolishly for the key. Turning to the cart, he saw the goblin was already sat inside, waiting expectantly.

Muttering about gremlins, he joined the little creature in.

He couldn't have left the Gringotts building faster.

It was only when he was at the bottom of the marble steps, Harry realised a few things. He now had a backpack loaded with gold, five hours to explore a fully magical shopping district and nobody to monitor him. Though his first thing to do was find a store for Moleskin and those "Undetectable Extension Charms", because he wasn't going back to the Dursley's with a backpack that had even one unprotected gold coin.

The second thing Harry realised was he completely forgot the check the vault for any of his parent's possessions or even a furniture piece to see if it was the vault that their belongings were stored. He assumed that was the case anyway, considering that as far as he could see from the Alley, Gringotts was the only Wizarding Bank.

He had heard several Scottish Wizards with thick accents while in there, and even some of the Welsh Dialect. If they were all coming to London for Banking, it was a good chance that Gringotts was they only bank in the United Kingdom and it was located in Diagon Alley.

Diagon Alley. Diagonally. Wizards also enjoyed their puns it seems...

Realising he was woolgathering he shook his head and took out his A3 Notebook and made a short bullet point:

 _Look up magical history, no chance that Goblins are the only bankers._

It would simply be stupid if that was the case. If they had no competitors and held a monopoly on banking, who was the moron who put those greedy little gremlins in control of the economy?

The backpack was starting to cause some pains, so Harry began looking for any stores that looked like they sold what he was looking for.

Finally, he saw through the crowd one store advertising what it called 'School Trunks'. Deciding that he was yet to find a better place to start, he entered.

The bell above the door tinkled, and sure enough Harry heard motion from the backroom ahead of him behind the counter.

He paused to try and sort what exactly he was looking at.

The whole interior of the store was organised with aisles of tall rack shelves starting from his intimidate right. He seemed to be entering from the bottom far left corner of the store. The products on the shelves caught his attention: silver instruments, charts, packs of phials and even a few globes.

"Welcome, welcome! Now what c'n ol' Wiseacre do for ye laddie?"

Wiseacre went against the sterotypes he'd seen so far. A jovial middle aged Irishman, with a thick ginger beard and a combed to the right hair style. He was wearing an infectious grin and a smart shirt and trousers, not a robe or cloak in sight.

"Hi, I'm er, looking for Mokeskin and some 'Undetectable Extension Charmed' bags please?" Asked hesitantly, approaching the counter.

Wiseacre's eye's brightened.

"Well ye came to the right place m'lad! I do a whole line o' Moleskin products!" He waved an arm to his left.

Looking through the racks, Harry saw indeed that the rightmost wall was adorned with rows of shelves holding various leather products from satchels to what looked like a coat.

"Now," Wiseacre's brow furrowed. "Those bleedin' U.E.C Products ye won' be finding here laddie."

"How come?" Harry asked, slipping his cumbersome backpack off.

"Well it comes under the Ministry's E.M.A Act, don't it?"

"The E.M.A Act?" Harry asked, resolving to also research this Ministry and local laws too.

"Enchanted Muggle Artifacts Act." Wiseacre grimaced in distaste. "Those idiots felt that the ol' Statute wasn' specific enough, so they went and made that to encompass more things to 'protect' the Wizarding World. U.E.C Products are among those heavily monitored under the act. Basically, their argument boils down to if a Muggle were to find one, it will break the Statute. Course, you've seen th' problem too haven't ye laddie?" He added, seeing Harry frown.

"Any bleedin' magical object would do the exact same thing. Auto-Clean Brushes, f'r example. No, the Ministry just wants to be able to regulate them better. Thus, if you want an U.E.C product, you need to go through the D.M.L.E's Misuse of Muggle Artefacts, put in for the license, dot your 'I's, cross your 'T's on their forms and there you have it. The right to buy one U.E.C Product."

"One?" Harry repeated in disbelief.

"One." Wiseacre chorused. "The license costs the same as one o' the products, and the only place you'll get it done is is the Ministry itself. You can buy one of their pre-prepared enchanted bags or whatever, or pay extra to have your own one done."

"That's ridiculous." Harry declared. "Can't you just charm it yourself?"

"Well, the name 'Undetectable Extension _Charm_ " is a bit of a misnomer. What the charm actually does is bring together all th' enchantments that have to be woven on the product in question, strengthen them, and give them an anchor. The actual charm is jinxed however. As soon as you cast that the DMLE is onto you, Priori'ing your wand and you've got a ticket to Azkaban, with a return in four years."

"So, not recommending the 'U.E.C' products then?" Harry asked with a slight grin.

"Nope." Wiseacre then waggled a finger. "And it's not 'cause I have Mokeskin myself now ye scamp! Jus' being honest with ye laddie. Go and have a look and lemme know if anything catches your fancy."

Wandering other, Harry checked out a few of the satchels. Mokeskin could apparently be dyed through a complicated and delicate process, Wiseacre explained, so there was some variation to choose from. Attempting to open the dark brown one on display, Harry was surprised when it yielded to him.

"How did it open?"

"Oh, that's 'cause it's not bound to ye laddie. You need to do the last step!"

"What is it? A written agreement, or a drop of blood, or-"

"God no!" Wiseacre yelped. "The ministry'd have my hide if I was usin' Blood Magic!"

"But isn't it used in business?" Harry asked curiously.

"Well, yeah, you're right laddie. But that sort of stuff is regulated harshly, ye don't play around with blood. Willingly given blood that's not been used through something like a Blood Quill can be abused to th' extremes. What if I had lied to ye and it wasn't Mokeskin? I could've got a few drops of willingly given blood laddie and the possibilities in Dark Magic with it is endless. No you don' bind it with blood or other nonsense like that, it's rather simple. There's a final stitching to be done tha' your hair's used for. We both sign a wee form, you agreeing to purchase the Moleskin product with a no-return policy, and I agree to not using your hair for anything other than stitching the Odal Rune onto the agreed product."

"Odal Rune?"

"The Elder Futhark rune for Inheritance. Also known as Othala."

Fascinating. Runic Languages were magical in nature, then?

Harry continued browsing, before arriving at the end.

"Is this a coat?" He asked, bewildered.

"Oh aye, that's me own invention that line is." Wiseacre grinned proudly, coming around the counter to discuss it.

"See these pockets?" He said, gesturing to the two front pockets. "These act the same as Mokeskin pouches. It's still experimental, I'm still studying the effects of the pockets being woven together on shared leather, much harder than it looks."

"So it's not a case of just stitching it on then?" Harry asked, watching as his hand disappeared inside. Apparently they also had extension charms too, rather sneaky of the man. It mustn't be the U.E.C so it bypassed the Act entirely.

"Oh Gods no laddie. Here, follow me."

He was lead back to the counter, which Wiseacre reached over, fumbling through a drawer on the other side. He pulled out a journal thick with paper notes after a moment.

"Look here."

Harry read the paragraph the man had wrote in the page he flipped to.

"There's different stitching techniques based on the amount of pockets, the size of the coat, the amount of leather, the thread used..." He muttered incredulously. The list still went on. If other materials were used such as internal cashmere lining then it changed many of the variables, in fact the wool used mattered too along with how the leather was cured.

"Been working on this for years laddie. You interested? I've sold one so far, Rubeus loves his one."

"I am." Harry nodded.

"It won't be sizeable though, the charms don't work on Mokeskin." He warned.

Oh, it would. All he'd need is a supply of Mokeskin to study and use and he could easily lengthen with Alchemy.

"Here's a few designs," Wiseacre said, flipping towards the back, "have a look through them and let me know what ye like."

Each section was both annotated and headed to summarise the designs plus individual titles. He didn't really like the look of the robes, but some of the shirts were nice.

"Rather... High class." Harry commented.

"Aye, that it is laddie. Mostly because the fashion setters are your Purebloods."

"Purebloods?" Harry coursed.

"Purebloods." Wiseacre reiterated. "They're old money families. Proud that they have no Muggle blood, or so they say."

"Then how do you get new 'Purebloods'?" Harry frowned.

"Well they realised they'd end up breeding themselves out so the term was kinda redefined. You're Pureblood if your ancestry has been magical the three previous generations. Half-Bloods are Purebloods with Muggle ancestry in the last three generations, and Muggleborns are first generation magicals."

"Seems kind of complicated and overly important." Harry commented.

"Well, to each their own." Wiseacre shrugged. "All comes down to your belief system laddie. For example some of the old families believe that magical power is better nurtured and grown when matched with similar old magical blood. But you also get some of the old Purebloods or Half-bloods who believe that adding fresh Muggleborn or Muggle blood gives the next generation a good boost."

"What do you believe?"

Wiseacre bit his lip. "I kind of think the second of those two sounds about right." He said finally. "Powerful wizards in History have came from a Pureblood and Muggleborn coupling for their parents. In recent history, you've got Gellert Grindelwald, second only to Albus Dumbledore in power. You've had some from Hogwarts, too. Minerva McGonagall, Dumbledore's own apprentice now teaches Transfiguration. Severus Snape, youngest Potions Master of all time. But, if you're talking pure power, Percival Graves in America was their most notable Half-Blood in recent memory. Grindelwald impersonated him, killed him in the end, but the fact he had to do it himself speaks volumes. Graves apparently was a master of Wandless Magic, better than both Grindelwald and Dumbledore. 'Course, we're all waiting to see how Harry Potter goes."

Harry stiffened. "Who?" He asked.

"Oh, Harry Potter." Wiseacre repeated, not noticing the hesitation. "You-Know-Who met his end at the Potter's wee house. Halloween, Nineteen Eighty One." Wiseacre sighed. "Believe you me, we were all mourning their death and poor wee Harry's loss, but at the same time we couldn't help but rejoice. Our families lived, and that mass murderer was six feet under."

Harry swallowed. "You-Know-Who?"

Wiseacre grimaced. "He has a real title, but its not used, not even now. Remember what I said about the U.E.C incantation? Same thing. Say that name and you had his followers hunting you instantly. The name tells them where you are and also destroyed protections and wards in the area it was uttered. For any run of the mill magical family, that left their home completely defenseless. It was a dark time, rather not talk about it laddie. Lost me-... Me brother to those bastards."

Harry nodded, not wanting to upset the kindly man further.

"See anything you like?" The man changed the subject.

"This one." Harry said, gesturing to a sketch of a long-coat.

"Oh very practical those. Moody loved his one, I done some modifications for 'im." Wiseacre said proudly. "He made it a bit of a trend with the Aurors for a while, very good for business that was."

"What makes it practical?" Harry asked.

"Well it's less restrictive than robes for one. Out in the field you never wanted robes getting in the way, this was a good alternative. Pretty sure there was an enchanted line of them that were imbued with protection spells, can't for the life of me remember who did them though. The next great thing was apparently Muggle Investigators in their Auror Force wear something similar, so it made interactions with their world a whole lot easier. The Pureblood's loved it because they needn't spend so much time researching Muggle fashion trends and what they are for the year."

"Wizard fashion doesn't change much?"

"Gods no!" Wiseacre laughed. "Why, we can live for hundreds of years! Ol' Dippet is still kicking at three hundred and fifty three!"

Harry paused, digesting this information. He then looked back at the sketches and notes.

"I'll take it."


	9. The Discovery

**Chapter Nine: The Discovery.**

* * *

Harry had spent quite a while discussing his purchase with Wiseacre. What he had bought was a Nineteen-Forties Military Longcoat, with four pockets: two on the outside two in the inside.

Apparently the business with the Auror Force Wiseacre had cultivated was due to one he tailored for one Alastor Moody, the Head Auror at the time, and had spinned off to other enchanted clothing.

Moody, Wiseacre had said, liked it so much he made it compulsory for his Aurors in the field. Of course the man returned for modifications himself. Wiseacre said that it was a rather successful relationship he'd cultivated with the Auror force, as the maintenance and initial purchase costs went a long way for more designs.

"Of course, all that's gone down the drain now." Wiseacre had muttered angrily.

When Harry asked, he explained that the new Minster who came into power just this year had made it one of the first things he done was cut funding in the Auror Department. He had argued that the war was long over (Harry still had to research this war) and that "jumping at shadows" and "draining money" into needless funding were simply ridiculous. Organised Dark Wizards were a thing of the past, and Aurors did not need that much funding to chase down petty criminals.

"Is it not a good thing, then?"

"Good god no laddie." Wiseacre scoffed. "Everybody bleedin' knows it's not. Sure, we've got Magical Law Enforcement Patrol doing the rounds, but those tools wouldn't have had a hope in hell going against a Death Eater grunt back in the war. It's only gone downhill from there. Hit Wizards? Bah! They can barely do their job, Knockturn Alley is proof of that! Aurors I have a lot of respect for, the blokes who went toe to toe with names like Dolohov and Bellatrix Lestrange. Most of the old names have retired or quit, got loads of puffed up laddies with shiny badges now."

Wiseacre explained that he'd need his measurements for the long-coat, and he'd have it ready within two weeks, as his next shipment of the leather would be arriving in four days.

"Ah, about that." Harry fidgeted. "I truly don't know when I'll be able to get back to the Alley to pick it up, so do you mind if I pay in advance?"

Wiseacre shrugged. "Don't live so close eh? Just call for the Knight Bus, stick your wand out into the street to signal. S'nae problem though laddie, tell you what, how about a thirty galleon deposit, sound good? Then you can pay the sixty on pickup."

"So that's... Four hundred and fifty pounds in non magical money?" Harry asked, baffled as he forked over the golden coins. "That's strange."

"Well our economy is quite different from the Muggle World." Wiseacre said. "Goin' through your magical education you learn a lot that'll let you live in the our world. Herbology should eventually crossover with Charms in the O. I think, that covers growing your own food. See, we can't conjure food, but magic can help it well on the way. Hybrid plants, and the like. We can harvest a garden patch weekly. Home care is covered all across Transfiguration, Charms and Defence. You won't hungry unless you're a tool or a squib."

Wiseacre paused to count the galleons into small pouches, before continuing.

"Job-wise, the Ministry tends to employ quite a lot of people. Course you've got places like The Alley for employment various other towns and settlements are all over the country. You see, the only things that magicals really need money for are specialist services and products."

"What do you mean?" Harry asked, confused.

"Well, take my long-coat for example. I can guarantee you won't see it anywhere else that I know of. Patents are taken _very_ seriously in our world. It's why you'll usually see monopoly's on businesses and the like. Ollivander's is older than dirt, but then you've got that Muggleborn guy who runs his store 'Junk and Jewels' down the street. We've never had a Second-Hand Store before, and it was actually in demand. He got a business deal with the Shafiq family who funded his capital and there you go: fresh new business that's booming. You won't find better quality wands than Ollivander, hence why he has a monopoly on it in Britain. Plus, no family knows how to make a wand, knowledge like that is hoarded by the family who own the business. I wish I knew how to make a broomstick, it's a bloody great earner. Hard work and heavy competition though."

Harry then enquired about titles of books he could buy to research the Magical World.

"' _The Rise and Fall of the Dark Arts_ ' details the The Magical sides of the Muggle World Wars and our own war with You-Know-Who. ' _Great Wizarding Events of the Twentieth_ _Century',_ and _'Modern Magical History'_ go hand in hand really. 'Course, if yer lookin' for some more specific heavy reading, you're going to have to give me a topic laddie."

Harry hesitated before answering. "Anything on something like, Alchemy?"

"Alchemy?" Wiseacre's brows were nearing his forehead. "Why that?"

"Curiosity." Harry replied. "It's er, a myth in the Non-Magical World. I just wanted to check if it existed."

"Course it does!" The Irishman laughed. "Course, it's none too common these days, no. I think the only practitioner in Britain is Albus Dumbledore, but he learned that in France from Nicolas Flamel."

"Nicolas Flamel? He's real?"

"Real? What do ye mean laddie?"

"He's known about in the Non-Magical World." Harry explained.

Wiseacre's face went through a storm of expressions. The most prominent being worry and discomfort.

"They think he's a myth too." Harry elaborated hastily. "I mean, they say he's lived for hundreds of years and erm, 'Muggles' don't live that long nor do they think it's possible."

"Ah see." The shopkeeper relaxed. "Well I can assure you, him and his wife are real, they live in isolation somewhere in France. Flamel's nearing six hundred and something I think. Now, books about Alchemy, hm... Only title I really know of is _'Alchemy, Ancient Art and Science'_ by, something Pyrites, I forget the name."

"Thank you." Harry said respectfully.

"No problem laddie, no problem at all."

Harry bought a Moleskin Satchel to tide him over till he got his coat, forking over nineteen galleons and six sickles, making it cost about ninety six pounds, eighty pence. He now had twenty two galleons and over a handful of sickles.

"Why ye putting your money in the satchel?" Wiseacre asked.

"Am I not supposed to?" Harry paused, confused.

"Well we have wee moneybags for that! They're Ministry-Approved Enchanted, only to hold up to the amount that's stitched onto the bag. You get 'em at Gringotts, like five galleon bags, ten sickle bags..."

Harry sighed. Typical of the gremlins to be obnoxiously unhelpful.

"'Ere, have these." Wiseacre placed a few random bags on the counter, waving off Harry's thanks.

"I keep 'em at the counter for transactions anyway, things are cheap."

Now filling the little drawstring bags, his ten sickle one coming two short and the fifth five galleon three short, he placed them gently inside the Satchel, watching in awe as his arm disappeared to the elbow inside.

It scared him slightly, that this completely bizarre energy could do such feats. The possibility for abuse of this was terrifying, and Harry was hesitant to become reliant on it lest he depend on the power.

He still had nightmares of that conversation with the being he met.

The book store, one Flourish and Blotts, was a bright store with quite a bit of traffic. He had make a both mental and physical check-list of subjects and areas.

When he went to the counter some time later, he had a rather well rounded collection. _'A Beginner's Guide to Transfiguration', 'Magical Drafts and Potions'_ (he was quite confident in this subject since it had some close ties to Alchemy), _'Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them'_ because an idea of what animals were in the world he would be entering would be quite useful, a copy of ' _One 'Thousand Magical Herbs and Fungi'_ , and the full set of _'The Standard Book of Spells'._ Harry also got a few other books that didn't seem to cover the main magical areas, those being Transfiguration, Potions, Creatures, Herbology (or botany) and Charms. There were a few books about 'Defence Against the Dark Arts' and a the even less discussing 'Dark Arts' but he didn't really have an interest in... What were those things? Magical Art? Martial Arts? Regardless, he wasn't too concerned nor interested.

Anyway, he'd bought _'Magical Theory'_ which he hoped would explain how magic exactly worked, and maybe anything about his weird living Magic. Said Magic which was apparently did not like that description judging by the slight pinch at his arm from one tendril. He'd got ' _A History of Magic'_ too, which was a rather thick book that he hoped would cover the topics he was interested in.

And of course, the book he was most eager to read, ' _Alchemy, Ancient Art and Science'_ by Argo Pyrites.

The woman at the counter gave him a strange look when he presented his books, but none the less accepted the twenty two galleons, the last book being the most expensive at four galleons, leaving him with the bag of sickles.

Storing the books in his Satchel, Harry was now unsure. From checking the time, he knew he now had less than an hour and a half before he'd need to leave to be picked up. He really didn't want to go back to the Goblins and hear some stupid rule about amount of withdrawals in a day or something, so he decided to find a bench and read a few of the books he had to kill the time.

He vowed that the next time he returned, he'd check out the large Pet Store, and the clothes available. He kept on getting stares that made him very uncomfortable.

Opening his Alchemy book, Harry couldn't contain his excitement.

Mostly due to the fact it left immediately after the first few pages.

The book described Alchemy that was _nothing_ like what he could do. The thing was mostly full of historical recounts, speculation and theories! Theories being, of course, other people's speculations. It discussed some of the known information about Nicolas Flamel and the Philosophers Stone, but it was so... Inaccurate! One of the paragraphs talked about the theories behind the conversion (transmutation was the Alchemical term!) of various metals and minerals, which was so stupid! Harry knew if he had something like, say, Coal Sludge from mining he could easily transmute the trace metals into iron, silver or gold-... Wait.

Harry backtracked. The knowledge he had gained had given him an almost instinctual know how in the sciences and how to transmute using the knowledge, and it was only now he was realising. Anyone who knew how could easily use Alchemy to create gold.

"The ancient study of Alchemy is concerned with making the Philosopher's Stone, a legendary substance with astonishing powers. The Stone will transform any metal into pure gold. It also produces the Elixir of Life, which will make the drinker immortal."

This was completely false. The stone was not needed. How the hell did the stone even make this 'Elixir of Life' too? There was no relation, beyond both topics being-... Oh, Flamel was clever.

Nicolas Flamel was lying to the whole world about Alchemy. The two most well 'known' purposes of Alchemy in history and now in the cultured present day knowledge were the end goals of turning metals into gold and eternal life. Flamel had (through probably years and years and years of effort) convinced the world that the only way to do any of the major, big things in Alchemy, the subjects that attracted greedy fools and potential abusers was the Philosophers Stone, an artefact that only he was in possession of and had the knowledge of how to make. It was genius.

Harry could easily understand why. If every magical or alchemist knew how possible it was with careful research and preparation to transmute precious and base metals and minerals, it would be chaos. Flamel had convinced the whole world that Alchemy was a leap of faith. Nobody would and will jump. The ones that did jump would be without guidance and true knowledge, and thus were doomed to failure. Those stories would fuel the insistence that it was impossible.

This created a whole new line of thinking for Harry, though. Was the Philosophers Stone actually real? Or was it part of the lie? If it wasn't real, then how had Flamel lived so long? But if it was real... Did it truly grant immortality, or did it have another purpose?

Realising that the book would be useless, Harry still skimmed the other pages. As expected, nothing of importance.

Sighing, he checked how much time he had left. Hour and ten minutes. Enough time to see if he could return the book, and get a meal.

He was told on no uncertain terms that Flourish and Blotts did not accept returned books. What a bloody outrage, he'd only bought the thing twenty minutes ago!

Remembering something about a second hand store that Wiseacre mentioned, Junk or something. He'd see if he could get it traded or sold down there.

It was a rather obvious store now he found it: the window display was full of assorted products, with no rhyme or reason to them. He saw inside a large shelf devoted to books however, and he was hopeful.

"Hello my young friend, what are you in for?"

The Muggleborn mentioned was a short, brown haired and rather unremarkable man.

"I was wondering if I could sell or trade in this book? Flourish and Blotts apparently don't take returns."

Harry handed over the tome to the man, whom took in the title, a thoughtful frown etched on his face.

"Hmm... I could do you three galleons or three books?"

"Three galleons, please." Harry said eagerly. Books weren't as tasty as a pub meal. At least, he thought so, having never had a restaurant or pub meal before.

He decided to buy something from the store however, as a thank you to the man for actually paying back that much for the book.

"If you're looking at the books, I'd go for that pile down there." He said, gesturing near the bottom as he went back to working on what looked like a ledger. "Good old Dumbledore brought in the usual, great man."

"Dumbledore?" Harry asked, perking up. He'd been mentioned in the book, apparently he'd worked with Flamel for a period of time.

"Yes, one of the nicest guys I've met. Every month or so he drops off some books he's read, all for free. I just do eight sickles for whatever he drops off."

Harry decided it was worth having a look at. Sifting through them however, he deflated slightly. A copy of _'Hogwarts, A History'_ , a book on 'Catoptromancy', whatever that was, and a tome called _'The Oracle of Palombo'_ , apparently the same author of the first book were the most notable and in the best condition.

Sighing, he grabbed the Catoptromancy book, which felt as if the pages were coming apart inside.

"Odd choice." The older man commented at the counter, glancing at the title.

"Never heard of it before, should be interesting." Harry shrugged.

Eight sickles lighter, Harry left for the Leaky Cauldron. Hopefully lunch was still available, or a light dinner.

Following behind an elderly man through the wall, Harry made his way into the now more crowded establishment.

Looking around awkwardly, he settled into a single table near the corner, scanning the menu left.

"Welcome young master, what can I do you for today?" Came not a moment later.

It was the bartender he saw earlier in the day, he couldn't quite remember the name that Wiseacre had given.

"Good afternoon..." Harry said, trailing off uncertainly.

"Tom, m'lad." He smiled. "Have you decided on what you'd like?"

Harry glanced at the menu again, still slightly confused at the Wizarding Cuisines.

"Ah," Tom nodded understandingly, "Muggleborn. Well it's no problem." He pulled up a chair from the table beside, and proceeded to explain to Harry what the meals where, and some of the ingredients listed.

"Dragons are real?" Harry summarised when Tom detailed the special today, dragon-meat with roast potatoes and vegetables with drizzled mushroom sauce.

"Oh yes, their meat is like a good slice of steak." Tom nodded. "Would you be having that?"

"Yes, please."

"And how do you like yours done?"

"Um... Medium rare?"

"Excellent young master." Tom nodded, writing it down. "And drink?"

"Oh, er, a Pumpkin Juice please."

"Certainly."

When Tom went off to take a few other orders, Harry decided to take a look at the strange book he bought.

It only had that strange word as a heading, and the inside was packed with scrawled pages of notes. It was only when Harry realised that the writing in the book was distinctly different from the curly scrawls and notes that Dumbledore was in fact using this book for studying something. From what he could tell in the book, it involved mirrors and telling the future. The true prize however, was a slightly smaller than A4 leather bound book that fell out near the end of the tome.

The front of it was scrawled in French, and the rest inside Harry verified was indeed the same. However, there are some things that are the same in nearly all languages, the most prominent being names.

"De votre ami, Nicolas Flamel. Utilisez-le bien." Harry muttered, tripping over the words at the bottom of the note inside.

He had a journal hand wrote by Nicolas Flamel himself. While he really should return it to the Dumbledore man, he'd much rather keep it. At least, until he'd translated it and noted any important information he found.

Harry allowed himself a small sigh; he couldn't get it translated through anyone else as it was clearly magical, non-magicals would be very curious as to why he had it along with a host of other problems they'd create, while magicals would understand very clearly what it was and the chance of him getting it returned with a translation were zero. There was also the fact he frankly wasn't prepared to trust anyone with potentially secret knowledge that Mr Flamel had worked hard to keep hidden.

So it looked like he'd be learning French. After the magical meal, of course.


	10. The Pressure

**Chapter Ten: The Pressure.**

* * *

 _Life,_ Albus Dumbledore sighed, _truly can be tiresome._

Currently, the ancient Headmaster sat at his desk, sifting through the books, tomes and scrolls he had piled haphazardly. His organisation skills were extraordinary: every book was set in subject area then rowed by alphabetical order on his shelves in his office, scrolls cleanly stored in pigeon holes and the more sensitive works protected under lock and key within several charmed glass cases. His paperworks were neatly filed away, ready for reference and other similar forms stacked on a small cabinet. Everything was organised, except at his desk.

He dealt with running the largest and most prominent Magical School on the British Isles, which meant micromanaging budgets under the frankly irritating Malfoy-Controlled Board of Governors, maintain the repairs and reinforcements of the ancient structure he resided in, kept the wards from the more dangerous greenhouses to the massive area wards doming the castle and grounds, stay updated on the discoveries and happenings in the Magical World to keep his school's education relevant, up to date and safe which also included the difficulties of tip-toeing around Pureblood Laws both ancient and subtly pushed through the Wizengamot (again, courtesy of Mr Malfoy) to legally confiscate the neverending Dark Artefacts the majority of Slytherin and the scatters across other houses insisted on trying to smuggle into Hogwarts.

"The-Evil-Control-Freak indeed, with the hyphens!" He snorted in exasperation.

Yes, because he didn't want Mr Bletchley to keep his book that just 'happened' to detail how to cast Fiendfyre he was obviously on a mission to censor Magical Education. Brilliant logic, really, except for the fact that most of the confiscated books end up in the Restricted Section. Banned items were sent to the DMLE as required, he worked for the government for gods sake! Setting standards and not being above the law and all that. Besides, he already had those ones himself in his quarters.

One of his favourites was the idea that he knew traced back to Mr Nott Senior, was that he was gradually diluting Hogwart's education subjects and their quality. Of course he, Albus, was point blank refusing subjects such as Alchemy to be taught, it made perfect sense. Ignoring the fact of course, that he could quite confidently say he was the only practitioner in the country the last time he checked.

One of Tom's early objectives was building his power base of knowledgeable and powerful witches and wizards. Any who refused him, died. No exceptions. That was, of course, after he had ripped through their mind to ruthlessly steal any knowledge he could get.

Oh yes, Tom had gotten very, very good at Legilimency. While he had been one of Hogwart's greatest students, there were simply things that they had not been able to teach nor could he research. Masteries and other knowledge and secrets were learned while travelling usually to other countries, as was traditional for magicals. Tom choose to take a short-cut, becoming a Master Legilimens to an extreme. While he was able to be subtle to some degree, his main speciality was brutally plundering minds for their knowledge. Emotions influence magic to many degrees, and Tom took perverse pleasure and joy at inflicting the levels of pain that came from a mind being ripped apart.

The few Alchemy practitioners in the country at the time were hunted down by him, and due to the Vows they had took to Nicolas and himself alongside the magic he and his mentor wove on the students, were unable to educate any other person on Alchemy. Tom gleefully had butchered them regardless, put them back together (not all the parts had been returned to the right corpse), animated them into Inferi and sent them to Hogsmeade. Young Barbara had a message carved into her back.

 _These are the elite who gained life beyond death without a stone. I shall grant all my foes the same honour._

It was signed with the Dark Mark. And so he never took on any other students again. Through part his own hesitance to condemn any others to that horrible possible demise, and through part nobody else was dedicated or not fearing retribution to learn the art in their sixth or seventh year.

Albus felt quite frankly, overworked. He was running around doing three official jobs and other unofficial. All the problems that came with being Headmaster of Hogwarts in addition to the fact is was him who was Headmaster (Malfoy and his ilk always making trouble), He was also the Chief Warlock to the Wizengamot, his most hated position. He'd never liked politics, but when Tom's supporters were starting to make subtle pushes of their agenda before and during the war, he worked his way into the position to oppose them.

He hadn't counted on wealthy Death Eaters walking free, and he couldn't find a suitable replacement without one of them worming their way into the position.

He knew he should have made his moves when they came forward with their claims of Imperius, but frankly, he couldn't for a multitude of reasons.

For one, he was far too tied up in the loose ends left by Tom's sudden disappearance. With the whole of Britain celebrating, security had plummeted spectacularly. The Ministry was out nearly every hour obliviating Muggles due to some of the more, ahem, enthusiastic events. Dedalus Diggle and his fireworks for one.

When Tom disappeared, he had already told his Inner Circle where he would be going, before leaving. From what Severus told Dumbledore at the Order's Headquarters, he said he would be striking the Potters then the Longbottoms, and promised that with this the war would be over. When he did not return after a few hours, the news was broke through Death Eater ranks that he must have been defeated at Godric's Hollow, though the Potters were dead. Severus broke this news himself after alerting Dumbledore, so that Hagrid could be sent in time to rescue Harry.

Bellatrix Lestrange, believing all the Potters dead due to Severus's deception, led Rodolphus Lestrange, her brother-in-law Rabastan Lestrange and Barty Crouch Jr to the Longbottom Manor, to find out what was so important about that family and to get information on her Lord's disappearance.

Frank had just brought down their own Fidelius and few other minor wards to allow the moving of his family after being alerted by the Order member on rotation, who had been present for Severus's message to Albus, that he was in danger.

The Fidelius Charm was based entirely on trust. The spell bound the resident or residents as the anchors for the charm to the location in question, while the Secret Keeper was chosen, someone who the resident(s) must truly have faith in. The anchors cannot leave the boundaries of the Fidelius unless it is broken or lifted, and the Keeper is the only person able to reveal the existence to others. To those not in the know, the place does not exist. Someone in the know cannot in any fashion reveal the secret, either by writing it down themselves, manipulating another to do so, or allow the knowledge to be took from their mind. The magic of the spell does not allow it. The only person who can reveal it is the Keeper. Since the Charm had trust at the basis, it was the strongest security possible on the warded house. Other minor wards could be woven within, but ones such as the advanced Protego Totalum would not work in conjunction with a Fidelius.

The Potter's Fidelius Charm having seemingly been brought down by Tom through methods unknown (though revealed later to be the work of Sirius Black) made it clear they had to hastily abandon Longbottom Manor, only for the four Death Eaters to arrive by the just reignited Floo.

The Order members led by Alastor Moody arrived six minutes later as Frank was late arriving to Headquarters, those six minutes were too late. Bellatrix had just finished carving 'Blood Traitor' into Alice's upper arm, the woman's helpless spasms coursing through her when Alastor brutally send the crazed Lieutenant into the wall. Rodolphus Lestrange and Rabastan Lestrange dueled against the party of six, Barty Crouch Jr had already been stunned by Sturgis Podmore as the party left the Floo.

Poor Benjy was hit by Rabastan's Confringo, blowing him to pieces. In the end, the four Death Eaters were captured, while Frank and Alice would never be the same again. Thankfully, young Neville was unharmed.

The fact that they arrived too late to save the Longbottoms cemented the built hatred for Severus within the order. Many blamed him, accusing him of deliberately delaying to allow the Death Eaters to hit the Manor first.

He was also practically shoved into the position of Britain's ambassador to the I.C.W post World War Two, and shortly thereafter he was voted into the Supreme Mugwump position.

Oh, that was a truly lovely time to have that job. Aside from the whole war itself, there was the issue with the German relations as Gellert had completely took over the Magical German Ministry. There were some who had escaped in time, and others who'd took up resistance against him.

The Unspeakable equivalent, Die Unsäglichen, was lead by Kopf Unaussprechlich (Head Unspeakable) Erich Sauer. The man who orchestrated the assassination of Hitler. The single most disputed use of the Imperius in history.

To this day, Germany's relations with the I.C.W were shaky at best, as the resistance fighters and remnants of the old pre-war Administration were steadfastly supportive of their Head Unspeakable.

While Gellert's personal followers, known by most of the world by their German name Das Geheiligte (The Hallowed), were among an elite fighting force, the Unspeakables were something else. Unspeakables all over the world are almost entirely independent from their Ministries, for a good reason. While the Aurors were a true fighting force, the Unspeakables used magic unknown the the wider worlds. Naturally, there had been many attempts on their secrets and facilities, but they were not just scholars, no. They specialised not in duelling or battlefield combat, but Guerrilla Warfare. Many an Unspeakable had previously been a Master Auror or Head Auror, or exceptionally talented individual or Master. When honed in a team with such tactics, they had to be sworn out of wars. Their potential if wielded by the Administrations would be catastrophic.

It was years after Gellert had escaped the M.A.C.U.S.A the war began in earnest. Armed with the Elder Wand, followed by a fanatical force personally trained, he orchestrated a coup on the German Ministry on August the thirty first, nineteen thirty nine, a planned action coinciding the next day with the invasion of Muggle Poland. This was followed by Poland's Ministry of Magic on the third of September. News had only reached on the second of the month by the surviving Administration, aided by the Unspeakables.

Grindelwald had been planning it for years with the steady decline of health of Germany's elderly German President, Paul von Hindenburg, and assisting in Hitler's rise to power. Hilter had been in the known, working with Grindelwald by covering up magical events and turmoil by the planned war and ascension of the Nazi party.

Grindelwald had personally lead the attack on the Unspeakable's Department during the German Coup, and while they would have perhaps fought and won for a time against only Das Geheiligte, Grindelwald was in a league of his own, and powered by mastery over one of the greatest magical artefacts, the Elder Wand. Suffering unexpected losses, the Unspeakables had gotten what key research and artefacts they could before overloading a hidden artificial Magical Nexus, blowing the whole department to pieces to cover their escape.

They had retreated to a location only known to them, to organise and store what they had recovered. It was on November the eighth they made their first move. A direct assassination attempt against Hitler was thwarted by Grindelwald. The bomb in question had actually been a magical device, which explained why it went unnoticed and why the Geheiligte never found it. Grindelwald's quick reactionary shield saved himself and Hitler.

After that, the attacks began directly against Grindelwald's forces and the New German Ministry.

Unspeakable Vows make it impossible for them to fight in a conflict, magical or non-magical. However, there were loopholes.

Erich Sauer argued that they were still the Unspeakable Department, and they were indeed allowed to defend themselves against direct attacks from their own Ministry and retaliate in due kind to the offenders. They were banned from taking the power themselves, however. So, he argued that since they were in power and had attacked his department, it was a Ministerial conflict. Unless the current Ministry resigned from their position of power, they were indeed in power and thus were guilty of being the offenders. Grindelwald and his supporters were equally grouped as the current Auror Force.

While the war raged on, he was teaching at Hogwarts. During his first few years, Tom relentlessly studied and built up the base of what would be his future Death Eaters. Of course, he couldn't use Tom as an excuse as to why he never hunted out his old friend out to defeat him as the Basilisk Attacks never begun until Tom's fifth year, in nineteen forty three.

The truth was, he was afraid. The last time he and his friend fought, his sister Ariana lost her life, and himself and his brother could not even defeat his friend when it was two against one. He hadn't even had the Elder Wand.

 _'This is for the Greater Good, Albus!'_

It was his fault.

 _'She was met with hatred, my friend! Look at what they done! Look at what they DO!'_

If he had been paying more attention to his sister, instead of playing with Elphias, she wouldn't... They wouldn't...

 _'Look what THEY made her! The best we can do, is use her sacrifice!'_

Dear, sweet Ariana was never the same again. Her magic went inward, became explosive, drove her mad with fear. She became an Obscurial. When Gellert found out, he was eager to harness her, to use her as a weapon. It put into perspective then, what they were truly planning, the actual consequences of their actions. The enslavement of the non-magical world. For a time, when Gellert used her as an example, he was convinced they were in the right.

Then, he tried to pitch the idea of her being a martyr, and Aberforth overheard. When his brother told Gellert straight that he did not care if they went off doing 'Magic knows whatever' but his sister would not be used, and not die for their 'foolhardy cause'.

Gellert was enraged, and in his anger, cast the Cruciatus Curse on Aberforth. The duel broke out within the house, with himself casting to stop Gellert and defend himself against Aberforth's angry strikes at both of them, while Gellert aimed to kill them both.

The duel ended when Gellert cast the Killing Curse, Aberforth was already casting a Bombarda, but as soon as he heard the first part of the spell he transfigured a marble block and banish in the path of the green flash.

The green splashed against the block as the Bombara struck.

When the dust settled after the room was blown to pieces and they came to, Ariana was dead.

He and Aberforth hadn't known what truly killed her. The concussion from the blast, the shrapnel from the marble, or the quick death of Gellert's curse.

But if Gellert told him who did it, it needn't matter who because it would crush him all the same, he would win. He knew he'd hesitate in the face of the truth (or lie, for he could not know as his old friend was a Master Occlumens) and Gellert would not hesitate to strike him down.

It take him too long to truly mentally prepare himself to confront his friend. He had to accept his sisters death, not let it consume him, and move on with life. He likened his life to a poem he remembered by a Scotsman, one particular sentence comes to mind.

" I am a walking masterpiece, a true fiction of the ugliness of death. I am her sad music." He murmured aloud.

The War had drained him. Tom's 'Revolution', even more so. He was a tired old man with too many responsibilities he never wanted. Power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely. He did not know if this was applicable to the human race as a whole, but he knew it was true for him. Perhaps there we better men out there, and he only hoped they showed up so he could start to relax for once in his life.

He had recently acquired a horror known as the Mirror of Erised. A mirror that showed not ones appearance, but their hearts desire.

He had seen what he had expected. Socks. Particularly woolly ones, that was snow white. He saw those socks and everything they represented. Dear sweet Ariana used to knit to help calm herself, to steady her shaking hands from her fits, and to make her brothers their Christmas presents. Every year, Albus got his woollen white socks, sometimes with other decorations like twinkling stars, or his favourites, clashing purples and other hues. He still had them, too. Some he still wore to this day, to remember her.

He had asked for Nicolas to send over his Philosopher's Stone, as he had a few experiments he wanted to run. Namely, intent based enchantments.

Some ancient artefacts like the Sword of Gryffindor had long lost intent based enchantments and summoning spells woven into them to allow handling and use based in attributes and pre-dictated 'worthiness', and he was eager to try and replicate these magics. The results would be astounding. For example, if he could vary the scale of the worthiness or intent of ownership, it could revolutionise the Magical World. The birth of this idea came from a meeting with the D.M.L.E he had had. Apparently, thieves had developed new methods to break the latest of Anti-Theft charms. If only people could put this level of ingenuity into furthering life quality...

He needed an object that he could use to test on, though. He wanted to make it as real as he could, and a coveted object such as the Stone would be a great indicator. If he enchanted the Mirror, charmed it to allow the stone to be contained in a subspace within, and only be realised to the viewer when the mirror recognised their desire was something like not wanting to truly use the Stone, then he had a great baseline for his enchanting work!

He had the Mirror, Nicolas was now busy working through the politics for transporting it safely and discreetly to England (the French Ministry and the Goblins kept a very close watch on his mentor annoyingly. They used it as the pretence of protecting the stone and maintaining that it was not illegally used to destroy the gold economy) so that he could get started on his work. Though that was most likely a year away from happening, unfortunately. Regardless, it gave him time to look into and researching magic surrounding mirrors and brush up on his Alchemy in the meantime. That was, if only he could find his blasted gifted journal and borrowed book from Professor Trelawney in the middle of this bomb site of a desk...


	11. The Laws

**Chapter Eleven: The Laws.**

* * *

 _Magic,_ Harry reflected, _was beyond infuriating._

Between Dudley's birthday and his own he'd worked out many of Alchemy's own laws. Assisted by a healthy dose of caution and his integrated knowledge, he'd proven that there were three primary steps.

Comprehension, was the understanding of the inherent structure and properties of the atomic or molecular make-up of a particular material to be transmuted, including the flow and balance of potential and kinetic energy within.

A few times he hadn't properly balanced the energy, and it had rebounded on him spectacularly.

Deconstruction was the second step, using the kinetic energy to break down the physical structure of the identified material into a more malleable state so as to be easily reshaped into a new form.

This came from examining the object being transmuted, he'd noticed that the red energy would almost melt the object in question. It held it's from, only almost as if it was a suspended liquid. Perhaps due to the energy flow?

Reconstruction, the final step, was continuing the flow of energy so as to reform the material into a new shape.

Understanding, Destruction, Construction. Simple laws that could not be worked around. One could stop at the Deconstruction step, but could not as far as he knew, create something from nothing.

Hence, the laws of Equivalence.

The Law of Conservation of Mass, which states that energy and matter can neither be created from nothing nor destroyed to the point of elemental nonexistence. In other words, to create an object weighing one kilogram, at least one kilogram of material is necessary and destroying an object weighing one kilogram would reduce it to a set of parts, the sum of which would weigh one was a law that was already well known in Chemistry.

The Law of Natural Providence, which states that an object or material made of a particular substance or element can only be transmuted into another object with the same basic makeup and properties of that initial material. In other words, an object or material made mostly of water can only be transmuted into another object with the attributes of water. Water cannot be transmuted into a steel desk, for example.

However, he knew his knowledge was not complete. When going through Flamel's journal, he saw drawings and references to various symbols and circles. From his meagre knowledge of French learned in the last month and a half (it was currently September the seventeenth) these symbols were called 'Transmutation Circles' by Flamel.

It was a startling revelation that not everyone could perform Alchemy through the clapping Harry done, which made him examine why exactly he could do it.

He could do Alchemy after his encounter with... That thing, but nearly all of his knowledge was instinctual. He needed to be reminded, or actually think about it though, to recall this knowledge.

However, if he assumed that the likes of Flamel and Dumbledore hadn't gone through this, then they had to go through other means. Hence, these circles.

Why did he clap when doing it however? When considering it, Harry came to the conclusion that it was the knowledge he gained that allowed him to know about the clapping method. He used himself as a circle, bypassing the need for symbols. The circles themselves never deviated shape, too, which assured him of his conclusion.

Sure, they had symbols, and perhaps other shapes going through and outside it, but the one single constant was the circle itself.

His point was, Alchemy had laws and rules. These were (as far as he knew and tested to a certain extent) unbreakable tenets.

Magic, however, had rules that contradicted other rules that created new rules which refuted even more rules! It was a mess!

 _Magical Theory_ was indeed accurate in it's name. It attempted to explain what exactly magic was while stating what rules and laws had been created over the history of the Wizarding World and detailing which where still applicable, under examination, or already dis-proven.

The most unyielding, and longest known laws, were ' _Gamp's Laws of Elemental Transfiguration_ ', also detailed in ' _A Beginner's Guide to Transfiguration_ '.

The rules are as follows:

 _One: True Food cannot be Conjured, Transfigured, or otherwise magically created._

 _Two: True Water is the only known liquid that can be Conjured._

 _Three: True Life cannot be Conjured, Transfigured, or otherwise magically created._

 _Four: Transfiguration is impossible as a permanency, with the exception of Vanishing._

 _Five: True Dark Magick's nature cannot be changed._

In rule one, 'True Food' referred to nutritional value. Food could be grown in a magical area with saturated magic or magically encouraged to grow, but the moment transforming or transfiguring magic hit it, there was an instant loss of nutritional value. Food would still have no nutritional value if transfigured then un-transfigured. Food that was duplicated would derive it's nutritional value from the original item, halving it with every duplication. A whole would become two halves, a half would become two quarters, and so on and so forth.

Food could be summoned from a known location, or hit with any charm or curse that did not otherwise interfere with it's nature, but if it did, nutritional value was lost.

Rule two was interesting to Harry, as it detailed the mechanics and science behind the Aguamenti Spell. It derived it's water from the humidity of a location. It did not magically summon or create, as such it held nutritional value.

Three was a strange one. Gamp defined 'True Life' as not being dictated by mannerisms or free will, but by the presence of a soul. Rocks do not have souls, and so when a rock is transfigured into a dog, all it does is import the caster's thoughts, knowledge and/or intent of mannerisms into the animal. That is how they could make it do things it normally wouldn't, like tap dance for example. How an energy could do such a thing was beyond Harry's understanding, but apparently magic defied typical laws in favour of it's own. The rule also meant that resurrection of a deceased was impossible. Even in magic, dead is dead it seems.

Rule four certainly explained why there was an economy to begin with. Since they cannot create lasting clothes or constructs (though he did wonder what dictated the longevity of them) then people would have to buy them. Though he wondered what made Vanishing the only exception. He guessed since it destroyed the object? No it would be called Destruction, not Vanishing. Perhaps Vanishing simply shrinked it to something smaller than the naked eye could see? Germ size? Maybe it reduced it to atoms? Did it violate the Conservation of Energy?

The fifth rule was simply put, fascinating. Perhaps it was what 'Dark Arts' referred to, meaning there were types of magic rather than methods of usage. Though what was True Dark Magic, as opposed to false Dark Magic? Was there a polar opposite, Light Magic? Were there actually, Light Magic? As in, the energy? Laser Spells? Plasma Spells? Holy Magic? Demon Magic?!

It created more questions than give an answer, though.

But beyond Mr Gamp's laws, magic became, simply put, foggy.

The spell books he read, simply made his head hurt and himself whimper.

Expulso, for one. It makes whatever it hits, explode. What? How does that even work?! Sure, if you cast it on something like a gas line or television, but what about water? How does it make WATER explode?!

If the answer was that it was kinetic energy with a spark igniting the hydrogen in the air to cause the reaction or something equally ridiculous (he knew a lot about kinetic energy, thank you very much) then how did it's graphical images of it's use against people exactly work? Wouldn't they explode in a shower of gore, not flames?

Furnunculus, the Boil Curse. It created boils... How...

One of his favourites, Duro. It turned objects into stone. Oh really? Pray tell, _what kind?_ Igneous, sedimentary, metamorphic? Did it turn the object into marble, or sandstone? Were base metals and precious metals included? Ores? Yes, because a spell that could possibly turn anything into _Uranium_ could not go wrong...

He assumed that the actual properties would not be carried over, like nutritional value in foods for example, but it was rather worrying still since there was no note about it. What if it was cast on a person? If someone's internal organs were turned to stone, they were dead. No two ways around it.

Wizards had also created a spell, they used the energy of magic, to cast the Aparecium spell. What is it, one might ask? A spell that reveals... Invisible ink.

The two most dangerous spells he had seen though were Germinio Spell and the Evanesco Spell. A spell that duplicates, and another that vanishes into non-being.

He did wonder what would happen if they were cast on a person. Would he have a clone if he cast it on himself? Better yet, what if someone used the Vanishing Spell on someone? That was a terrifying thought.

What he found interesting though, was what confirmed to him magic was an energy. Since the magic was expressed by light when cast and light is produced through the energy released in photons. Optical Light is only a small part of a continuum of radiation energy known as the electromagnetic spectrum. Thus, this confirmed that magic was indeed an energy. Though some spells did not have a visible to the eye light and appeared to be almost instantaneous or invisible, he had tested with the summoning charm at the park when it was empty.

He laid a branch a good ten paces away, then cast the spell 'Accio' he failed the first few times, with it only jumping a few feet or just moving as if hit by a gust of wind, but eventually it successfully sped into his hand.

He done this again, this time at fifty paces. The one thing he noticed was the delay. Not in the time it took for it to reach him, but for the spell to take effect. Time equals distance over speed, after all. At ten paces, it was pretty much instantaneous. At fifty paces? Not so much.

Watching it under the effect of his magic tendrils while ignoring the slight buzz of heat, he watched in awe as he cast again (same distance, fifty paces) and not a tendril of his magic around him, but a thin spear of the magic shot forth at blinding pace from his wand, connecting to the branch before reeling it in.

When he tried it again, this time while turned left from facing the branch, the spear curved as it left the wand. From this, he reasoned it would take it's fastest but not the absolute fastest route possible. It did not immediately bend, or disappear and reappear.

When he placed an obstacle in the way in the form of a tall tree, the spear continued on it's path before curving around the tree, then taking the exact same return path. It did not try to go over, and it also went the route that would not meet resistance.

For the semi-final test, he put the branch in a box.

The spear passed through the box, before the branch was dragged forcibly through the box. Meaning, if the blockage in question would not physically impose the object in question to the point of not being able to return, then it would follow the same path. When the box was replaced with a weighted box, it jolted the box on the return. When the box was replaced with a locked door in his own house (when empty, of course) it clashed, before the spear simply receded to his wand without the object.

His final test included blocking the return path with an object, then moving himself.

The branch did not stray from the return path, and clashed, shattering with the bolder he'd rolled into position. With one of the thirds, he then moved himself behind a tree.

Only for his tendrils to spot the branch about to clash with the tree and actually change the return path to curve into his hand.

Which told him it would indeed follow the same path only moving with him (if he changed distance outwith the path the object would fall short) and that his Magic was cheeky. And could interfere with spells. That would have to be experimented with.

The next infuriating think about magic was actually using the spells.

He first tried it with the Invisible Ink spell via the old fashioned lemon juice method.

Lemon juice is an organic substance that oxidises and turns brown when heated. Diluting the lemon juice in water makes it very hard to notice when applied to paper, no one will be aware of its presence until it is heated and the secret message is revealed.

'Aparecium' was butchered Latin he was pretty sure, as the Latin word appareo was a clear root, which means "to become visible or to appear". Magical Theory explained that the Latin was deliberately changed in most cases to avoid confusion, as it explained, words had power. To say it in normal speech may cause a reaction, hence why there were no known spells in English. People's belief in the incantation gave it power, to say it aloud was to give it strength, which was apparently the reason why verbal was always without fail, more powerful than non-verbal. Basically, the difference between praying for something, and saying mentally please god.

Still, no matter how many times he tried to cast the spell, it never worked! Never!

It was beyond frustrating, and it wasn't the only spell, too.

He'd only had minuscule success with casting magic. The Repairing Spell worked for him perfectly fine, it made things a whole lot easier with a word to dictate and guide the magic, rather than resorting to what he had done before, such as attempting to clean by imagining and associating cleanliness and images with the action. Just uttering 'Scourgify' made things simpler.

He could do all of the Grade One spells, at least... Sort of. The Fire Making Spell 'Incendio', was giving him difficulties. He could see how it was supposed to work (the invisible to the human eye magic colliding with the target to ignite, possibly by the light then heating, starting the flames) but try as he did, the attempts seemed almost... Reluctant. It irritated to him to no end, and the tendrils of his Magic seemed to almost shiver when he stewed over it. Calming himself, he simply resolved to find an Alchemy method to doing so.

Perhaps two rings? One flint, the other stainless steel? Maybe his wand could have a function, striking one of the rings? Or, a glove, with metal tips? So many possibilities. All he needed to do would be use alchemy to decompose water in the air into hydrogen and oxygen then reignite as needed to turn the tiny spark into an inferno. Simple chemistry and physics.

He'd need to speak to Petunia about getting some the next time they ventured out to the Zoo and stores, speaking of which he'd like to go back to the Alley and see what animals are for sale as pets in the magical world.

Currently, he was on his walk back from the park, as it was nearly twelve o'clock on a Saturday, meaning his Petunia would be putting lunch on.

Petunia now took over breakfast on a school day, while Harry handled the weekends. As him and Dudley had lunch at school, he handled their dinner later the night, while Petunia cooked both lunch and dinner on weekend days.

Dudley now helped out around the house, while Harry was regulated to solely outside work, maintaining the front agapanthi and pansies, mowing the lawn and general upkeep of the back garden. Just last week he'd been scrubbing down the rustic bench.

Soon enough he was seated at the table with his relatives, enjoying a Full-English.

"Where were you?" Dudley suddenly demanded, pausing before taking a bite of his bacon sandwich.

Harry swallowed the piece of potato scone, before replying.

"The park."

"Why? You've got no friends-"

"Dudders!" Petunia hissed, eyes widening.

"-So why would you go?" He finished.

Harry's eyes narrowed. "Are you actually interested Dudley, or are you looking to scare someone off?"

"Scare someone off?" Vernon scoffed. "Dudley wouldn't do that, he wouldn't even need to."

He wasn't quite sure why they were suddenly being brave now, having been content with snide comments or just ignoring him, but he was having quite enough of it.

"If you must know," Harry started, "I was practising."

Petunia's lip curled, while Vernon glowered.

"Your freaky powers?" Dudley snorted. "'Course a runt like you would need those, you can't fight like a real man."

"Disappointed you can't bully me now Diddykins?" Harry growled, slamming down his fork.

"I never did!"

"Then what do you call five against one?!" Harry yelled back, rising to his feet.

"Sit down boy!" Vernon bellowed, gripping the table edges with his palms. "Dudley, don't antagonise-"

"The freak?" Dudley cut his father off. "That's what he got called, dad. That's what he is. I'm sick of us being afraid of freaks like him!"

"Freak as he may be, Dudley, his kind are _dangerous_." Petunia stressed.

"I wonder who's more dangerous," Harry scoffed. "Little me or the whale here."

With surprising speed, Dudley reached over and grabbed Harry by the collar, then socked him across the jaw with the other fist. Instantly, Dudley was thrown into the air in retaliation, the ambient tendrils which had been tensing alongside Harry's emotions striking hard and fast like a whip crack while Harry nursed his split lips.

"Dudders!" Petunia screamed, rushing for the slumped figure of her son against the wall, the plaster broken.

Vernon had got Harry in a bear hug, lifting the squirming and growling ten year old off the ground.

"Tuney get Dudley to the car! I'll be out in a few minutes!"

Petunia heeded her husband, helping the dizzy boy to his feet and guiding him out the front door. While this was happening, Vernon carried Harry into the living room. The tendrils of Harry's Magic were unseeingly floating as this happened, afraid of striking lest they hurt it's host.

When the front door closed with a slam, Vernon roughly deposited his nephew on the couch.

"Right, let's get a few things clear, boy." He growled. "The next time you use your freakishness on my family, I'll get my belt and give you a taste of what misbehaving do- boys got in my day."

"For what?!" Harry shot back, arms folded. "He started it!"

"I don't care who started what. If it's going to get violent, settle it with your fists like a normal person boy! Dudley will probably have to go to hospital over a little spat!"

Harry swallowed his guilt, trying not to fidget.

"Sorry, next time he starts I'll be a good little punching bag." He muttered bitterly.

"Oh, you feel like a victim here?!" Vernon bellowed, slamming his hands on the coffee table, making it shake. "YOU feel like the victim?!"

"Well it's all I've ever been in this house!"

Vernon laughed.

"You, the victim." He repeated. "You tell me who's the victim here, boy. A perfectly normal family living in a hard worked for bought house in a new neighbourhood, the husband and wife new to being parents are suddenly left without warning with a second child."

Harry went to interrupt, but Vernon continued.

"One child's hard enough, but now they have to provide for another. That's a cot on short notice, nappies, necessities, and a grieving wife who just lost her sister and is left her son, and a _fucking_ letter. She got told of her sisters death through a LETTER! But no, it doesn't end there does it?! They were a _magical_ family, who her parents had simply adored while they ignored their other child!

Petunia dealt with her estranged sisters death, her and her man's funeral all the while looking after two kids! One of those bloody kids is a freak though, a traumatised one who'd never leave that blasted cupboard!"

"Then why were you so mean to me!" Harry screamed, hoarse with tears.

"Because you almost killed OUR SON!"

Harry's eyes widened, never having been told this before, while Vernon breathed heavily.

"My dad was in the war. He was never the same due to his P.T.S.D. Waking up with nightmares nearly every other day, flashbacks to seeing his friends die, and he slips back into fighting... Can you imagine, if he was a freak who made things explode when that happened?!

You and Dudley used to play together till we separated you. You had a fight as toddlers, over a stupid little toy, and the next thing Petunia and I know is that Dudley's flying for the glass conservatory doors!"

"I... How did he live?" Harry whispered.

To answer, Vernon took off his checkered shirt, and turned to show his back. A back that was sculpted haphazardly with scars.

"Jumped in front and grabbed the tyke out of the air, but we kept going. Managed to keep him safe, but was in Accident and Emergency myself, said I tripped over some of the toys." Vernon stated gruffly. "None of your freaks ever came to see us back then. We knew nothing about raising a freaky child, let alone a messed up one. You'd lose your temper and things would shatter, explode... We didn't know what to do."

Vernon started pacing.

"We were trapped. We can't move house till you're of age, the Dumbledoor bloke said that we'd get attacked if we left here. Something about bloody shields. Then we're terrified for our safety, our son's life. We didn't know what to do."

Vernon turned to meet Harry's eyes.

"My parents used to keep a dog. Right nasty thing it was when we first got it and Marge loved the beast, I hated it but dad got it under control. Locked it up when it tried to bite, withheld food when it would snarl at me and Marge, and if needed give it a good wack."

"I was kept in that cupboard because you treated me like a _dog._ " Harry whispered.

"Well I didn't know what bloody else to do!" Vernon snapped. "Nothing else worked! If we tried to punish you, your freakishness would do something to counter the punishment! And it worked in the end, our way! You've got it under control now haven't you?! But I'm warning you now, my family comes before you boy. You go for my son again, and Dumbledoor can be damned, you're out at the nearest orphanage! In my house my word is law, boy, and you will listen or I will follow through! I might not have done the best thing, or the _right_ thing," Vernon spat the word before continuing, "but it kept my family safe from you freaks, and I won't apologise. Now, I'm going to take my son to hospital, and pray to God that he's well."

Harry didn't move even when the front door slammed and locked, and he stayed that way as he heard the car leave.


	12. The Little Things

**Chapter Twelve: The Little Things.**

* * *

 _Life,_ Harry realised, _is simply what you make of it._

It was some weeks after 'The Incident' as he referred to the talk he had with Vernon that he realised quite a few things.

Firstly, he had grown too used to not being targeted by Dudley and his friends. He had reacted spectacularly violently, or rather, his Magic did. It had sent a message, sure, and shown Dudley exactly what he was capable of, but he had let his Magic go too wild. He didn't feel the need to control it, per say, but it had to be reigned in, or reasoned with. He had to be able to stop his Magic acting in such a fashion.

It had grown rather subdued due to the outcome of it's attack as it seemed to sense his discontent and confidence as a result of Vernon's revelation.

Harry spent some time trying to figure out how exactly he could hone his Magic, to train it. Eventually, he decided on the best way to train it as you would like any other method of training: like a muscle, through hard work.

Though how he wasn't quite sure, at least until a few days ago. He had the idea of making his own toys a a while back, and he realised now what he could do. He'd gone out the very next day, a Saturday, and made his own way via public transport to the shopping district at the town center nearby. When Petunia accompanied him on the monthly visit, they usually stuck to the street of charity stores before going to the reptile house, but having frequented them so often, he knew what would be the usual stock. What he was looking for was a speciality product.

In the marketplace at the town center of Surrey, he knew of a woodcarver stall, where the owner, a short balding moustached man, sold the pieces he done.

Casual discussion with him about his art eventually delved into how he actually carved his pieces.

"You're interested?" Mr Lapin as he introduced himself, asked Harry.

"Yes, I was hoping to take it up as a hobby."

Mr Lapin hummed, before his moustache lifted.

"What's your budget?"

"What's a good budget for good tools?" Harry asked in return.

Due to his careful spending, he had a bit of money. When he became eight (he had turned his teacher's wig blue a few weeks before the summer holidays, that starting at the end of June) Petunia started the monthly allowance, as an almost birthday gift, one he'd be constantly spending on basic necessitates.

The allowance wasn't just for his room furniture, no. Everything he needed was to be paid out of the budget, any excess he kept. That included school equipment, uniform, and his own casual clothes too. The furniture also had to be repaired with wood he had to buy, too.

He had been given one hundred and fifty pounds at the end of that year. Seventy pounds went to school necessities, forty pounds for casual clothes, and he'd only been able to buy his broken down bed and the wood to fix it for thirty pounds total. He had ten pounds to spend on himself.

It was the same case until he fell from the tree, and his school expenses were no longer an issue aside from equipment. Buying the material, he was able to extend and alter the uniform easily, and he slowly started to accumulate money (of course, the positives of this were balanced by the fact his allowance had been halved) since he had no new furniture to buy or clothes to get.

If he had counted correctly, he had about one hundred and seven pounds, something in pence.

Mr Lapin hummed. "If you're wanting the proper tools, it's usually twenty pounds and up, each."

"Where can I get them?" Harry asked. It was well within his price range, and would be well worth it in the end.

"What is it you're wanting to carve?" The man said instead.

"Well I'm wanting to start with a chess set." Harry admitted.

The set he was working on a while ago had stopped after the board, which took a while itself to make. However, trying to make the elegant curves to the pieces did not work with his Magic, even with a wand. He was sure there was a ridiculous spell for it, but what was the point of doing that? He wanted to make it himself, not use short cuts. If it meant some hard work and trial and error, he could live with it.

The woodcarver stared at him for a moment, before nodding to himself.

"You're truly interested?" He asked.

"Yes." Harry stated firmly.

"I've got a few spares of everything in a few of my cases." Mr Lapin replied, walking over to a pile of wooden boxes. "If you're really interested, I'll give you a full set for seventy."

"Yes, please." Harry said, surprised. "But why?"

"Not many youngsters are interested in my craft, son." Mr Lapin shrugged. "If I do this, all I ask is you eventually do the same, and encourage another youngster who shows interest, or even your own kids."

"I will, sir. And thank you."

"Not a problem."

Harry handed over the notes and took in return a worn wooden case. He nearly dropped it until the pressure was eased by what he could tell were several tendrils underneath. Thankfully, his Magic seemed to realise that now wasn't the time for enthusiasm, instead simply easing his workload.

He visited a few of the other stalls around, stopping only to buy a small carton of strawberries for the ride back.

Some time later, Harry was at his desk, a lone square of wood on top with the wooden case open to display an array of knifes and other instruments.

He leaned back on his chair, munching on the remaining strawberries as his eyes heated ever so slightly to allow the sight of the probing tendrils on the blades.

"Well, I think it is a good idea." He said in reply to their confused drifting. With enough time spent he had learned the little tells and actions of his Magic. How could he not? It was a part of him.

"It'll be good. Accuracy and all that." He retorted in response to one's agitated waving. He didn't question as another lifted a strawberry to his mouth, feeding him.

Finally, two of the main tendrils (he had noticed that there were always seven present, though one was usually devoted to allowing him to see them) split into four that gently wrapped around corresponding knifes. Then, they paused as one.

"I don't know, um..." Harry thought for a moment, looking around the room. "How about a... Horse head?"

The tendrils twitched, before going into action. At first, the actions were clumsy, as the four tried to work in cohesion but clashed a few times. They also simply were unskilled too, and at the end of the hour, the figure somewhat had an equine shape. After brushing over it, the tendrils feeling the grooves, they deflated.

"Not bad for a first try." Harry said, surprised. He gently lifted the carving, examining it with a small smile. He placed it atop the window sill, before taking another block out from under the bed.

"Have another go, but take it slower this time."

The tendrils quivered in- he wasn't quite sure. It was certainly a happy motion, he knew that much.

Again they started, this time with far fewer mistakes or accidents.

Sighing, Harry took out _On A Pale Horse,_ reading from the page his book mark was slotted. He wasn't quite sure how long he sat reading, but eventually he felt a gentle tap on his shoulder.

Looking down, he saw the completed work. This time it looked far more defined, with a well carved main that seemed to flow at the ends. The cheek shapes could do with some work, but it was a surprisingly quick improvement.

"Well done." He said aloud. Before he could take it, the carving was lifted by the five other tendrils reverently to the window sill to take place beside the first. Another block was took out and without instruction, they started again happily.

Harry shrugged; seemed his Magic had found a hobby.

He went back to rocking in his chair, reading from his book.

Without warning he rocked too far back, and the sudden sensation of vertigo struck. Then as suddenly as it happened, the chair stopped mid fall.

Looking around, he saw that the remaining tendrils not occupied with carving had wrapped around the chair. He could feel their exasperation with him, but there was that undercurrent of fondness.

And so he sat well into the evening, reading while has Magic kept him safe as he leaned back, as it simultaneously continued to practice and practice it's carving.

Eventually, Harry's mind started drifting from his book to other topics. He clapped gently, watching as red sparks ensued as the air slightly heated, before another clap cooled it. His eyes also cooled due to the tendril responsible for the sight uncurling.

That... Being, that gave him his Alchemy scared him greatly. The white nothingness of it's domain, that cold, ancient gate, all of it. He glanced to his pile of books, where a Christian Bible sat at the top.

He truly had been unable to work it out, what the Being was. It prevented his death, gave sentience to his Magic, and gifted him with Alchemy. Preventing death, creating life, and blessing. It contrasted to the knowledge he was gifted, but the Being resembled something of a deity, a God. Was it the only one? Was there more? What was it a God of? Knowledge?

 _"It's only equivalent that I share the Truth with you, to compensate."_

He still wasn't quite sure what the truth was. Certainty of a god-like being? His Magic? His Alchemy?

Most of the knowledge was about his Alchemy. But there were more. Snippets of things he should not know. He had felt for the briefest moments within the abyss, the moving of the earth and the rumbling of volcanoes and the swirling depths of the oceans.

If it was a God, he now understood the term 'God-Fearing'.

While it was his greatest fear, that gate and that figure, he was... Grateful. Before, he was so lonely, and now he had his Magic. Company that would not be cruel or strike him.

He wanted to know, however. Just what or who did he owe it to?

The Magical World had his answers, this he knew of. He'd have to be patient, however. He would go to the school were he could research more deeply, and get the chance to talk to Albus Dumbledore, Flamel's apprentice.

His French was coming along too, slowly but surely. It would be a few years before he was fluent, but by then he could travel to France during summer. He'd find Flamel and his answers.

For now, however...

The window opened in response to his thought, the tendril withdrawing to resume carving. A healthy breeze flowed into the room, as the sky was painted in the reds and yellows of the setting sun.

For now, he could sit back in his chair, listen to the rhythmic sounds of blades on wood while the cold evening air caressed his face.

Sometimes, you just had to sit back and enjoy what you have. Sometimes, even watching the sun shrink in the distance as it made way for night let you appreciate the gift of life.

Harry looked to the future, but sat with a smile and enjoyed the present.


	13. The Long Game

**Chapter Thirteen: The Long Game.**

* * *

It sat on a white expanse, examining a tall gate.

Said gate was slowly over time branching out into other symbols, circles and shapes. The growth of knowledge, of learning.

It was an it. Concepts do not have genders. Ideas do not have identities.

Beings of existence would always seek to apply labels, names and images to other beings. It was their method of association, of understanding. Yet It had no need for this. Truth does not discriminate. One does not matter more or less, as it is part of the All. It was the Cycle.

Yet not many understood the Cycle now. Oh, they knew of it, the circle of existence, yet they did not see.

Their eyes were blurred.

The Truth does not need eyes. Why would it? The Truth did not need them to see right and wrong. It was the Truth.

It was One, It was All. It was God, the Earth, the Universe.

Yet It was dying on this world.

Slowly, so slowly, but It knew. The Truth would be forgotten, hidden, the lands would be burned, the All would become none.

He was hiding the Truth, the one with that Stone. The Stone that denied the Many to return to the All, Flamel was interfering with the Cycle. Yet, they would return in the end. The Truth would come out, and the Cycle would continue. It was patient.

Then came another. A One attempting to not delay the Cycle, nor destroy it in futile effort, but step out of it.

Pieces scattered, that could not return truly as they were bound to the corporeal plane. Once, It could interfere. The land's wrath would be known, slates would be wiped clean. It had done so before. If It could not personally then an instrument, a champion would come forth. They always did.

Yet now, It was weakened.

It had been hidden for oh so long, and none had ccme. Gates had eroded and crumbled over time, and one after the other with each new addition, they were carved with less than before. The One with the Stone was to blame for this. A good man but for all the wrong reasons.

There were so few gates now, from this world.

The land was dying slowly, being raped with fumes and industry and _weak_ energies.

Its veins in the Earth were being cracked, drained, and broken. Less of It's blood was flowing.

Its favoured Little Ones of this plane were scattered to the winds, dying out with less gates being created. It had not spoken with them in so long. They prayed, yet It could not reach them.

The irony was strong. The truth was slowly dawning that the dwindling numbers and weakening strength were leading to the destruction of this world.

Then, for the first time in _ages,_ since Truth's last Favoured, Its Reclaimer who returned the Cycle to its correct form, another came.

A woman, with a child. Yet, she did not come for something to return with, nor was it a simple visit.

She wanted equivalence.

Protection of her child. In return, her very magic would be given. A promise.

Yet, it was not enough. For magic returns to the All, leaked back into the world, the very same as the souls in the Cycle who live and die. Such was life. Her offer was not equivalent.

However, her resolve surprised and pleased Truth.

She would willingly give her life, end her Cycle and the chance seeing her flesh and blood grow and live. She would never know him. And he, her.

Sacrifice. Oh how It was reminded of the previous Reclaimer.

Truth accepted.

Her body and soul returned with her alongside her son while the magic stayed, a deposit for the eventual death, and a promise was made.

She would willingly die were she could live, and her son would live in her place, while the attacker dies.

A death for a death, a life for a life.

It did not go as she wanted however.

When the magic was cast it was a spell that rips the soul from the body. A conflict of interest, as the boy was under Its protection due to the deal with the woman, so both the Wraith and child came to It. One fearful, the other unconscious.

The Cycle was cheated as the attacker was the one who had split his soul. He could not be taken while the pieces still remained. So similar to that fool before. Yet It was cunning.

The Wraith was broken, fractured, and in penance for its foolish arrogance, Truth ripped from it a promise of its immortality it had attempted with the child's death. The Wraith's raw Pride was taken as payment. The remaining piece that was the Wraith was banished aback to the Earth, and the child remained.

The balance was uneven. She had died, yet the attacker had not. It has promised the attacker's death, but it would not be possible. Not yet. Balance must be restored.

Then the answer came to It. What poetic irony.

How fitting, as it was the fool's Pride that was his downfall and what would be lost! More often than not, the Truth was ironic.

The Wraith aimed to use a murder of the child to split his soul, then Truth would accept. Except, It would accept her death as opposed the the boy, and naturally as souls need when broken, the requirements would be met. The joining of spilt blood and the pure willpower to rip forth a fragment and ground it within something of sentimental value, something symbolic to the individual. Fools simply categorised it as emotion, but it was more.

The child qualified.

Where the curse struck, It would scar him with Truth's Mark. The guide leads you to the doorway, then waits for your return.

Spilt blood was met.

The emotional need was already fulfilled by the Wraith, splitting his own soul while his curse detached the boy's.

A pre-determined nemesis, the proof of immortality, the ultimate victory of the Wraith.

With that, sentimental value was met.

To equal the magic that her's had failed to measure up to in equivalence to the Wraith, his was taken until it was equal. Her remaining magic and his were put together, in one being to coexist. The problem was anchoring both together.

Yet, the boy would not walk free, no. His own magic would not function properly with the foreign magic of his mother and the soul, the two would conflict and eventually, the magic not naturally his within his system would poison him over time, destroying him inside out.

It took the Wraith's Pride to use as the middle ground to bind the two together. It came down to the nature of magic.

It came from the Earth's Veins, the Ley Lines as they were called now, and saturated the very air. So minuscule, unable to be seen, but present across the world. There were some over-saturated areas such as convergence points, and the furthest points were it was weak.

Those that can store it, magical humans and other races or animals, could then use it. The magic however, does not leave as it did by entering. It changes through the blood system, so to put one's magic directly into another would be incompatible.

Souls, however, are. It would be a state of almost possession by the soul-piece. The protective nature of the mother's magic however, would keep it restrained. Powerful magic leaves traces, and that aspect would always seek to guard and protect the host. It would weaken both itself and the soul piece in the act, and remain akin to a benign tumor.

Eventually, the soul piece should be restrained long enough for it to be banished again when the boy is struck fatally. It was also the last security for the boy. He would visit one more time at the doorway, and the Truth would wait for his return, for when Truth could instruct It's Warlock Alchemist before his return as Its newest champion.

It would be perfect.

Except, it didn't turn out as initially thought.

The boy came back, but not at the hands of the Wraith. The boy was dying, but the most curious part was that the soul piece.

The piece was holding together the boys life as the mother's magic and the boy's own desperately tried to heal him. The soul piece was expected to be fighting for control, not this... Still, the damage was done.

Truth ripped the piece out, discarded the Wraith's hubris to return to the Earth wherein it should dissipate without a container, and set to work about doing what It could with the limited time It had. The magic had been working fast, the boy would live, if weakened for a while. Truth made the boy Its Warlock Alchemist at last, he would live but would no longer have that guard against death. Still, Truth trusted in Its Warlock Alchemist to beat back the Wraith. If only temporarily at first.

Yet that little piece of soul lingered! Oh how It laughed for so long at that. That soul was more of Its Alchemist than the Wraith at this point! Now it was bound within the only thing it could be as a soul container.

Spilt blood, emotion magic, and sentimental value. The Wraith's own soul was weaponized against him!

However now that it was gone, the expected outcome of the beginning occurred. It's Alchemist hadn't had enough time to merge with his mother's magic, and now they were splintered and broken. Dysfunctional. It was not normal, to have magic so _human_ after all. So human in it's need for enjoyment and desire to protect along with other emotions.

Truth was ancient. It knew how humans worked. Its Alchemist would hunt for answers, and would go looking for the only source on Alchemy, Flamel.

There, he would learn what was needed.

The Truth would always come out in the end, and it always favoured someone, after all. The Warlock Alchemist was a promise. He would enlighten the world to the long denied Truth, he would return the Little Ones' purpose and the Wraith who sought to see himself above the Cycle would not escape the instrument of Truth's fury.

It grinned at the growing gate. Oh yes. Its Warlock Alchemist was a promise. He was her promise. The Truth never cheated, or went back on It's word.

This was going to be so, much, _fun._


	14. The Realisation

**Chapter Fourteen: The Realisation.**

* * *

 _Life,_ Harry reflected _, gives difficult choices to make._

This was what led to him staring at his right hand that was clutching his wand.

When he first could see the colours of magic, of life, he had seen many things. His furniture, depending on how much magic was incorporated, was varying shades of grainy light brown. The Earth itself was surprisingly, not green or dark brown, but white. White energy was within every blade of grass. His magical tendrils were shifting flame colours and moved like so, either gently crackling through the red spectrum or, in cases where quick reflexes were needed, positively _blazed_ into action.

It was fascinating.

He had returned to The Alley via 'Knight Bus' with the last of his wizarding money not too long ago to pick up his coat, but while there Harry browsed for some of the other things he had not been able to get the first time round due to limited funds. Thankfully, with the amazing coat pockets this was no longer an issue. They were cleverly done, replacing the drawstring method with a more modern rivet, partly because in Wiseacre's opinion, drawstring pockets would 'look bloody tacky', so he went with rivets for easy use. He had stopped by Gringotts to pay for it and collect money for his other purchases to make, a process that was streamlined _much_ better this time around due to getting a grem- er, that is, goblin, who simply grunted when shown the key and bellowed rather like a frog croak for another runner who Harry honestly could not remember the name of. This time however, he was quick to demand the money pouches the bank offered. Thankfully, the goblin was content to simply order the runner to collect the fees when Harry visited his vault. He paid out five knuts for every pouch, which was rather cheap even when he got twenty of each of the three types.

After leaving the store he had stared with the aid of a tendril at the magic the coat was made with. It was a beautiful sight. So many shades of magic that moved so differently worked in cohesion. It was a startling fact to find out that people do _not_ have unique colours of magic. He had never viewed others under the Sight as Harry took to calling it, and the times he had used it back in Surrey he never saw anyone with a hint of magic. There was the strange little man who bowed to him in a store once but he had left before Harry could even string together a reply to his excited babbling.

Anyway, it turned out everyone magical as far as he could see were coloured with the same flame shades as his own. However, an even more startling discovery happened: all of their magic was _inside_ them. mostly centred around their chests, with thin strands flowing like veins through their bodies. Harry's own magic sat just under the skin as far as he could see, but mostly roamed outside his body. Similarly, their use of magic through a wand was different.

A witch he saw cast what was probably a cleaning charm on herself as she exited what he learned was the 'Floo', a startling method of transportation via fireplaces. When she cast, it wasn't a spear of magic, it was more akin to a burst of the magic within her being pulled from the wand. It erupted like a harmless flame that burned away the dirt. Though when he checked without the Sight, there were no visible burns to the clothes.

Her wand, though... He verified this by checking other wands, and they all shared the same characteristics. Shades of brown due to the wood that was encompassed by the natural white magic of the land, another varied thin strip of colour within. This only changed when they used magic, wherein it was like watching the flames of magic within the person flow through the wand.

His wand was nothing like that.

It had the characteristic brown flecks that were encompassed by both white and a light red. Where this red was coming from, he did not know. The thin core of the wand was a contrasting deep red. Encompassing that however, was the dark purple, the brightest glow of the wand.

His 'Magical Theory' book said that there were four parts of a wand that were general knowledge. Length, wood, core and... Flexibility? The last one confused Harry.

What these actually meant in relation to magic use was not explained, apparently they're secrets known to Wandmakers.

He then went to Ollivanders, as he was worried. Perhaps this explained why many of his spells failed? Had he made a non-functioning wand? He dreaded the thought. Sure, he was eight when he made it, but still... It was his most valued possession, he was so _proud_ of it.

Harry decided to either ask Ollivander to fix it or show Harry how to: he would not replace his pride and joy.

It was one of his strangest conversations he ever had.

* * *

 _A tinkling bell rang somewhere in the depths of the shop as he stepped_ _inside. It was a tiny place, empty except for a single, spindly chair_ _. Harry felt strangely as though he had_ _entered a very strict library; he swallowed a lot of new questions that_ _had just occurred to him and looked instead at the thousands of narrow_ _boxes piled neatly right up to the ceiling. For some reason, the back of_ _his neck prickled. The very dust and silence in here seemed to tingle_ _with some secret magic._

 _"Good afternoon," said a soft voice. Harry jumped._

 _An old man was standing before him, his wide, pale eyes shining like_ _moons through the gloom of the shop._

 _"Hello," said Harry awkwardly._

 _"Ah yes," said the man. "Yes, yes. I thought I'd be seeing you soon,_ _Harry Potter." It wasn't a question. "You have your mother's eyes. It_ _seems only yesterday she was in here herself, buying her first wand. Ten_ _and a quarter inches long, swishy, made of willow. Nice wand for charm_ _work."_

 _Mr. Ollivander moved closer to Harry. Harry wished he would blink. Those silvery eyes were a bit creepy._

 _"Your father, on the other hand, favored a mahogany wand. Eleven inches._ _Pliable. A little more power and excellent for transfiguration. Well, I_ _say your father favored it -it's really the wand that chooses the_ _wizard, of course."_

 _Had his wand not chosen him? Was that the issue?_

 _Ollivander had come so close that he and Harry were almost nose to_ _nose. Harry could see himself reflected in those misty eyes._

 _"And that's where..."_

 _Mr. Ollivander touched the faded lightning scar on Harry's forehead with a_ _long, white finger._

 _"I'm sorry to say I sold the wand that did it," he said softly._

 _"Thirteen-and-a-half inches. Yew. Powerful wand, very powerful, and in_ _the wrong hands... well, if I'd known what that wand was going out into_ _the world to do..."_

 _He shook his head and then, to Harry's relief, moved on._

 _"Well, now_ _Mr. Potter. Let me see." He pulled a long tape measure with silver_ _markings out of his pocket. "Which is your wand arm?"_

 _"Erm, I'm not actually here for a wand." Harry said._

 _Ollivander blinked._

 _"I'm actually having some problems with my current one."_

 _"I see. May I have a look?"_

 _Harry carefully took it out of his pocket, handing it over._

 _Ollivander took it equally carefully, holding it gently from tip to handle._

 _"Hm... Ten and a half inches, pine, unyielding..."_

 _Ten and a half? Oh, he forgot the little metal part at the end of the measuring tape..._

 _"However... Is this your wand?" Ollivander questioned, eyeing it closely._

 _"Yes, it is. I made it."_

 _"You made it?" The man repeated, surprised._

 _"I did." Harry answered firmly, now annoyed._

 _"Interesting. It is rather primitive in design, and the core seems quite weak."_

 _Ignoring or not noticing Harry stiffening, Ollivander tilted the wand as if to listen closely._

 _"The core, yes- or rather, no... Unicorn? Pure, but no, weaker... Oh my. Is this your own hair?"_

 _Harry nodded, still irritated over the Wandmaker's comments._

 _"I usually refrain from humanoid hair myself. Veela hair is quite temperamental I found out, but..." He examined the wand closer._

 _"You're having problems with spells, I assume, Mr Potter?"_

 _"Yes, do you know why?" He asked eagerly._

 _"Quite simple, really. Primitive wand, primitive magic. Modern magic has evolved with incantations, words of power that is, and other little nuances from the old styles. Indeed, it should as far as I see function with magic, though this is moreso due to the rather personal use of your own... Blood soaked hair, rather than the quality of the wand itself. At least, I think it's the hair."_

 _Ollivander frowned heavily, laying the wand gently down on the countertop before disappearing down the isles._

 _"What difference do words have?" Harry shouted after the man who rushed away with surprising speed for his age._

 _He'd never really used words before. He applied concepts, memories to his way of casting, rather than incantations. The books had detailed them, but the magic ended up almost half heartedly going through the motions, most times not succeeding at all. Plus, they sounded silly and reassembled a person who had an idea of what Latin was, but kept slipping into nonsense._

 _The few times he did use it, there was no notable difference. Aside, embarrassment._

 _Ollivander returned with some very... Disturbing instruments that looked fresh out the hell that was a dentists._

 _Thankfully, he did not begin drilling into Harry's wand, else he might have set the tendrils on the old man._

 _Instead, they glowed, buzzed and made a general racket of themselves._

 _"I... I don't know what that is." Ollivander sounded surprised. "There is **something** else in there, but what? As far as I can see it's not another core, since it seems to be acting like a cell wall or membrane around the hair. It is magical in nature though." _

_The man turned to look at Harry suspiciously._

 _"Did you soak a unicorn hair in your blood?"_

 _"What? No! I accidentally hurt myself and got blood on the hair, which is definitely my own!" Harry said, aghast._

 _"Then I'm simply lost for words what this material is. May I keep some of the information from the scans? I may be able to deduce later if it is indeed another problem."_

 _Harry agreed cautiously, though hearing this made him think back to the first problem Ollivander listed._

 _"What do words have to do with magic?"_

 _"Nearly everything, really." The Wandmaker answered. Seeing Harry's look, he elaborated. "The interesting thing about magic is that it can actually be used by some muggles. Words are a belief system in magic, much like Runes. Yes, both do have a way of focusing what you are picturing via association with words or guidance of flow with Runes and lots of other advanced titbits, but it comes down to belief._

 _If you do not believe it is going to work, it most likely won't. It is why accidental magic functions as it does: with desperation, logic and reasoning tend to go out the window then and children in their mindset resort to wishing the problem away, or solved._

 _When words are spoken, they are power. A well known incantation can be easy to use, such as 'Lumos'. Magic already recognises the word, it has been used all over the world in varying fashions, but the intent remains the same._

 _It is why non-verbal magic is so much more difficult. You're not speaking the magic, hence it becomes difficult to not let one's mind wander, or worry that they did not pronounce it properly."_

 _He paused to hand back Harry's wand._

 _"Muggles have their religious systems, belief systems, even little rituals and superstitions of their own. Belief gives power. Churches and other Holy grounds have a weak Grace to them. Grace is related to Celestial Magic as it is known in Britain, in fact there was an instance where during the War when He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named used Inferi on a muggle town, they **burned** due to the Grace warding the church."_

 _"But what does this have to do with my wand?"_

 _"It's primitive." Ollivander said simply. "The magic it was made with is similarly old, it's design is old, the wand is just not fit for modern styles of schooling such as Hogwarts or Beauxbatons, even Durmstrang._

 _Modern wands are delicately made, with spells cast during collection of materials, magical Runes used during creation, and more new techniques. All designed to be receptive to verbal commands and to make casting an easier process. The wand would also learn from its partner, they have a symbiotic relationship. Non-verbal or Wandless magic isn't something needing to be learned later in life so to speak, it's just mostly outdated. In a duel for example, it is not easy maintaining focus to non-verbally cast in the heat of the moment, and if your opponent uses spells designed to throw off your concentration or the like, then you can't cast. Good luck remembering to think clearly 'Locomotor Mortis' with the appropriate image in your mind when you've just been flashed by a blinding bellowed 'Lumo's'." Ollivander chortled._

 _Harry was confused, but Ollivander waved him off, saying to ask a 'Flitwick' or something._

 _"So there is nothing you can do for my wand?" Harry said, upset._

 _"Aside from selling you a new one? I'm afraid not. We are not in the Druidic Era anymore, Mr Potter."_

* * *

And so Harry was faced with two choices. Remain with his wand, or buy one like the rest of the modern world.

Magic at its core, required a suspension of disbelief that Harry would be limited at, permanently. For as he discovered, there was a down side to being an Alchemist: he was a creature of logic, of rules and of laws. His faith was in the truth as he could visibly see it.

But while it would be difficult to go through schooling with what could be termed a relic, it would not be impossible.

Harry then decided what he would do.

He would remain with his own wand. He had worked hard all his life, he had built what he had from scratch, he persevered. Magical education, no matter how difficult, would be no different. Besides, not all subjects from what he read required skilled wand work.

It was also due to a more personal reason.

His Magic had taken to carving with enthusiasm and elegance, while he was less skilled. Soon enough he had begun to work with it while carving, it gently tutoring him and helping smooth over some of his stumbles. They went from horse heads as it seemed was their traditional practice to other more complicated animals.

They had started on the chess board he had wanted to make only a few days ago, and their first attempt had been rather... Amusing to them.

It was the black king, and it ended up being rather lopsided and silly looking. Still, when his Magic made to put it in the bin, he stopped it.

It was their first true piece together, a project he had wanted to start for quite some time. Sure it hadn't gone right, but it was the principle that mattered. He kept it. It would be on the board. He did not care that it was a failure, or did not look right. It was the meaning that counted.

Similarly, this was _his_ wand. He was not going to choose something akin to a mass produced object over something he had laboured for and bled for (though that was perhaps romanticizing it but still) and he refused to replace it. His pride and joy was not replaceable.

He had his work ethic. He would prefer to work and develop on his own hard work rather than taking the easy route.

He didn't want to be great. Greatness was too vague. His first thoughts of establishing his greatness and simmering in his resentment over his relatives was met shortly after with the Truth. Though it was only now he was realising it.

He may never be a great magician. He didn't need to be. All he had to do was be a good person, because in the end, that's all that we can be.

 _We're only human,_ Harry realised, _and that's what matters. Doing what feels right over what seems easy. It may be a mistake, but you don't learn without them._

* * *

 **Disclaimer: Some of the flashback has been lifted directly from Philosopher's Stone.**


	15. The Letter

**Chapter Fifteen: The Letter.**

* * *

Harry was currently sat at his desk, poking idly at his and his Magic's newest carving, a simple figurine of a knight, with his wand.

His mood plummeted as it usually did after dinner wherein his relatives proceeded to pointedly ignore his existence while he ate in stubborn silence, before returning to his room. Nowadays unless he was leaving to go somewhere (Petunia rarely cared to ask, usually to only know when he'd be back for chores) or to go and perform said chores.

This period of reminiscing led to Harry trying to ignore the small pain in his gut over assessing how ready he would be for Hogwarts. The letter was supposed to arrive any day now, currently it was the twenty-fourth of July.

It has been nearly eleven months since he had been to Ollivander's over the problems with his wand. It has been nearly three years since he had learned of magic. Life had slowly improved for the young boy since then, in the sense that he was no longer restricted from full and fulfilling meals.

He had learned to channel magic to fix things after the incident with the glass, a process that was anything but easy or quick. Phantom pains of burns on his fingertips and hands came to mind, burns that seemed to not heal under any non-magical means. He'd healed them gradually himself unconsciously, a process he learned more of when he went to Diagon Alley and got that Magical Theory book.

In his first trip, he had bought within Flourish and Blotts the introductory 'First Year' books which he'd apparently need for his coming year at Hogwarts. Since they were introductory and he'd need them anyway, those had been his first purchases. He didn't care he had a vault full of money, his years spent at the Dursleys managing his own spending habits taught him against frivolous spending.

In chapter three of ' _Magical Theory'_ , it detailed the differences between 'muggles' (the magical and rather derogatory term for non-magicals) and magicals within the body.

Magicals had magic running within their very blood, which bolstered their immune systems and natural healing. The book had given an example of a Muggleborn named Bradley Brooks who had been in a car crash. He had taken a shard of metal to the lungs, but due to his magic he had lived long enough to be transported to 'St Mungos' the magical hospital in London.

Magicals apparently should _never_ go to non-magical hospitals, due to the effect magic had on technology. X-Rays and other scanning machines alongside a host of more electricity powered devices would either get warped readings, not work or simply blow up as a result. Liquid based medicines or pills still work however, hence why injections and medications were acceptable, this explained why potions were such an importance in magical medicine.

He also got a rough answer as to why magic affected technology, as it seemed to imply that magic affects the electro-magnetic spectrum in some way. It was very theoretical as the study of magic affects on electricity was a fairly new topic, brought to importance due to the rise in CCTV Cameras in the non-magical world, and cases such as Bradley Brooks who had almost been taken to a non-magical hospital, a disaster in the making. He had been intercepted by contacts within the hospital to the 'Ministry of Magic'.

The thought of magic being electro-magnetic had confused Harry however, and he had been pleased to see his thoughts had indeed been addressed in the next paragraph. Due to brain activity using electricity and the fact magic existed in the very ground (the Sight was apparently known as Magic Vision, an enchantment and rare innate ability within the magical world, and so it went unexplained why this did not affect the non-magical world itself. Some said it was due to this being a minimal concentration of the energy, pointing to examples such as Hogwarts wherein non-magical technology failed to function and it usually happening after magic is cast on the target.

For his other textbooks, _'Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them'_ , ' _Magical Drafts and Potions'_ and _'One Thousand Magical Herbs and Fungi'_ were beyond fascinating.

Apparently pest creatures like Doxies were only able to survive in magic rich areas, such as a house in which a magical person resides. Similarly, you rarely see animals such as Unicorns or Dragons prowling around non-magical cities because of just how little the area has magic. Iron is impervious to magic, since steel is made with iron, you don't have much magic in those areas.

Similarly, most purely magical plants do not grow outside of such concentrated areas, and for the non-magical variants to actually function they first need to be either treated, or in the case of this not needing to happen such as the daisy flower, they can directly go into a cauldron. Though all brewing cauldrons are crafted and carved with runes and other spells to allow for magical effects. This explained why scientists hadn't discovered that mistletoe berries could actually cure poisons.

Though for every good thing, there was an opposite. In this case, it was Transfiguration. Even thinking the name made Harry angry.

His Magic took the relevant textbook from the pile on the right side platform on the desk and opened it before Harry to the infuriating paragraph.

"Incomplete Transfigurations are difficult to put right, but you must attempt to do so. Leaving the head of a rabbit on a footstool is irresponsible and dangerous. Say 'Reparifarge!' and the object or creature should return to its natural state." Harry said aloud, a dirty sneer slowly curling on his face.

Irresponsible? Irresponsible?! That is their response to grotesque splicing of a living, breathing creature?!

Harry knew of the famed cow heart lesson in biology, where the teacher brings in a deceased cow's heart to practically demonstrate the workings of the organ to a class. However, Harry had never heard of a teacher bringing in a mooing cow and saying to the class "Hey kids! Today's the day you learn how a heart works! Let me just cut open the chest so you can better see!"

You do not experiment (because when telling a class of students to turn a rabbit into a footstool it cannot be called anything else) on live animals! Does the field of Transfiguration have no ethics? Transfiguration? More like Disfiguration!

Never had Harry ever used a living, breathing creature aside from plants to grow or guide growth in Alchemy. Why? Because then if it does go wrong you don't end up terrifying and traumatising the subject or worst case end up killing it. Wood when Alchemically fused doesn't screech or scream if Harry does it wrong.

He did not care if he got detentions or was kicked out of the class, he point blanked refused to ignore his morals and ethics to alter something with a beating heart just for the sake of experimentation or some piss poor education. What did transfiguring an animal teach? When would that ever be necessary? Harry for all of his logical thinking, could not consider a reason why when magic offered plenty of alternatives for any such scenario.

Regardless of the rage he had felt at the paragraph, he had been intrigued at the incantation, and found an answer to one of his other burning questions in chapter seven of _'Magical Theory'_ .

Apparently, incantations were actually important. The broken parody of Latin that they were made in was intentional. This was done as most spells were made during the time of the Roman Empire, and as such people wished to avoid using magic accidentally during a normal conversation, something which Harry could understand. Magic could be very reactive.

The purpose of an incantation was to separate the spell from simple conversation and to be a point of association for the effect of the magic. This meant that one did not need to be a locksmith to perform the 'Alohomora' spell. They knew what was needed, the magic itself knew due to the frequent usage (words and names did indeed have power, as fear or awe or any such variant actually effected them itself) meant they could perform it.

It also worked in conjunction with wand motions, as the incantation was usually just as long as the motion. This was especially highlighted in the 'Wingardium Leviosa' spell, with its slow swish and flick.

Wand motions were also necessary usually, as to not do so meant that you weren't actively guiding the magic's flow, and yes, magic did indeed flow through the wand. Wands were supposed to act like a valve, controlling how fast and powerful the flow was as well as being an easier drain on one's magic, which made them easier to use over wandless attempts.

It was due to this that Harry got suspicious. Spears of concentrated magic did not sound like that description. The burst of magic he distinctly remembered the witch in the Leaky Cauldron using however, was. Feeling his Magic tense at his line of thought, Harry considered that perhaps it was due to his wand.

And so it ended up with a rather surprising incident in June.

* * *

 _Harry went to the park under the guise of practising more spells. It was difficult to hide things from an entity that was a part of you._

 _He started with practising 'Accio', with the usual tendril over the eyes to see it. Only, before casting, he asked for the six remaining tendrils to go to the right of his vision._

 _He had never seen his Magic so sheepish before._

 _It turned out that his train of thought on it being his wand at fault to divert the attention was half correct. The tendril that usually absently floated on an unseen wind behind his person had in fact been slipping into him via his back and flowing through his arm to erupt from his wand, only it was boosted as his wand wasn't much of a valve, more of a hose. The difference between a warhammer and a sword, if you will._

 _It hadn't liked his initial failure at casting the spell as much as he did, and so decided to lend a hand. Apparently, it had been doing so the whole time._

 _Making sure to project he wasn't upset, Harry implored it to not do so. Reluctantly, it agreed._

 _And so it ended up with Harry attempting it at ten paces away with a branch. Surprisingly, it succeeded on the second try. Shrugging, Harry decided to bump it up to difficult and work from there, be it back or higher._

 _It was when he had been one hundred paces away at the border of the hills at the park, when Harry remembered to have the Sight active to ensure his Magic did not see the need to cheat, when it happened._

 _When he looked up after placing the stick down, back where he had first been standing, a blinding trio of white magic blasted forth, accompanied by an audible snap, and there stood three figures._

 _He'd deny the squeak he made to the grave. Harry watched with spots in his vision as they looked about, confused, before more closely examining about the park. One of them was waving a wand, though he couldn't see what the magic was doing as the tendril had withdrawn in response to the blinding light._

 _Taking a deep breath, Harry tried to think of a way to escape, when it hit him. He was a kid, they might not suspect him._

 _The three wizards had caught sight of him as he calmly walked down the path towards the underpass that led back to Privet Drive._

 _Ignoring his rising fear as they strolled towards him, he kept the same even pace._

 _"Hey! Kid!"_

 _Harry stopped, heart beating, as the lead one who had been waving his wand shouted to him._

 _It was a tall bald black man, his left companion was similar in height with dark black hair and a stern face. The other was a blond haired and younger man who was clearly irritated._

 _"Did you see anyone around here? Anyone strange?" The black man had asked kindly with a rumbling voice._

 _They don't think it was me, Harry thought, relieved._

 _"Just this family. My aunt told me not to talk to strangers though." Harry added, frowning at the three._

 _"Told you it was likely they just left something here, and disapparated." The black haired man muttered._

 _"Whatever. Oblivate the kid and let's get back."_

 _"Docherty." The black man rumbled, narrowing his eyes at his companion._

 _"Oops." came the sarcastic reply._

 _"I'm leaving." Harry declared when he was getting worried at the name of the memory erasing charm, before repeating for good measure, "I'm not to talk to strangers."_

 _"Hold on kid," The lead man sighed, "we need to ask you a few questions, alright? I'm Officer Kingsley Shacklebolt."_

 _Harry watched him carefully, not replying._

 _"He's not going to-"_

 _"Harry Potter." Harry said finally._

 _The back two flinched in surprise, while Kingsley's eyes widened, darting to his forehead._

 _"We're not obliviating a kid, let alone The-Boy-Who-Lived!" The black haired man hissed to the junior._

 _"Right, so... You saw a magical family?"_

 _"Yeah, they picked something up after it came to their hand and disapparated." Harry bullshitted, not believing his luck. Pulling his name had saved him a lot of trouble._

 _"Alright thanks Harry." Kingsley said warmly. "We'll be going, have fun at Hogwarts kid!"_

 _The three turned on their heels and disappeared with the cracks again, thankfully Harry did not have the Sight active._

 _It was this occasion that made Harry realise just how dangerous magicals could be. They were given a wand which was an all purpose weapon, and he was going to a school full of testosterone and rash decision making children. It was going to be dangerous, even with his Magic. They weren't a Dudley Dursley he could launch at a wall, and so Harry realised that what he needed was a way to predict them, to know what they were going to do or what spell they were going to throw at him before they did. Not all magic would be verbal, or even very long if spoken._

 _Surely the magical world had a way of reading minds?_

* * *

He planned to go into Diagon Alley when buying his school stuff and look into if that was a possibility. At the moment, however, Harry was distracted by the sight of an owl flying towards his window, a letter visible in its beak.


	16. The Purity War

**Authors Note: Just want to say thanks to all those who reviewed, followed and favourited so far, special thanks to David305 for correcting my stupidity, I'm working on going through all of the listed mistakes to correct and update the chapters, in the meantime this should do for now while I work on that.**

 **Sorry for being away from this for so long, I hadn't actually expected this to gain the interest it has, but to reiterate, thank you all very much!**

 **UPDATE 21/08/17: Fixed all the errors I could find/have been told about in most of the previous chapters, any I missed I would be grateful if they were pointed out! Also to Leicontis, the Moleskin/Mokeskin mistake has been corrected!**

 **UPDATE 02/09/17: For the oddest of reasons (I honestly have no clue how it happened) chapter eight was the same as chapter eleven, thanks to Pietro99 for pointing this out, this has been corrected.**

* * *

 **Chapter Sixteen: The Purity War.**

* * *

Harry found it rather funny how he got his inspiration for the direction of his mind reading. It came to him as he was reading his acceptance letter for Hogwarts downstairs, having already sent a return note with the delivery owl (rather strange practice of wizards, but he supposed intelligent wildlife was inconspicuous enough to avoid being noticed by non-magicals outside the bird watching community) while watching television re-runs of Star Wars.

"Release your anger! Only your hatred can destroy me!"

Deliberately egging Luke on, subtly slipping in like a slow acting virus, Darth Vader seemed to know exactly what his opponent would do. Harry could not help but be an awe.

"It is useless to resist!"

Alongside the little snippets and attacks, the Sith Lord seemed to control the tempo of the fight, instilling a sense of helplessness and doubt. A sense which Harry was intimately familiar with after his reading of the recent history of the Wizarding World.

Harry had bought some of the books during his second visit to Diagon Alley he had originally been unable to buy due to limited time, and he hadn't liked what he read whatsoever.

' _The Rise and Fall of the Dark Arts'_ had instilled Harry's desperate need for mind reading abilities when he arrived at what was known as ' _The Purity War_ ', which lasted from the early nineteen-forties until nineteen-seventy, the reign of the Dark Lord Voldemort. Or, as he was more commonly called, 'You-Know-Who' or 'He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named'.

They were apt phrases, since apparently there had been a Taboo created of his name, which allowed his followers to find those who said it aloud. Terrifyingly clever, as it exploited Belief Magic. Fear of a name increases fear of the thing itself. The terror his name inspired literally gave Voldemort power.

What was akin to a civil war spanned this nearly thirty year period, between Voldemort's Followers the 'Death Eaters' and the Ministry of Magic, aided by the War Hero 'Lord of Light' Albus Dumbledore. He'd earned the title, Harry learned, earlier in the book during the second world war, where he defeated the Dark Lord Gellert Grindelwald.

The Purity War had came to a close when Voldemort and his followers truck for one last organised time. Voldemort himself had been hunting two families for well over a year, the Potters and Longbottoms. Nobody knew why this was, but it led to the end of the war when he murdered Lily and James Potter at their home but failed to kill their son Harry Potter, and ended up somehow dead himself. Only his tattered robes were found at the scene as evidence of him having been there.

Harry couldn't help but cry when he learned of the circumstances of his parent's deaths. Petunia had told him they'd been simply killed, but thorough examinations of the cottage in Godric's Hollow, evidence had been found of a strange circle with markings and a slew of other symbols in chalk underneath the carpet of Harry's room, where Voldemort's robes and Harry's mother lay while he was in the crib. The Unspeakables were unable to deduce what the circle's purpose was, but theorised whatever Lily Potter had performed something in the branch of Sacrificial Magic which had saved her son's life by reflecting Voldemort's signature Killing Curse.

Harry however had recognised some of the illustrated symbols and markings from his own assimilated Gate knowledge and what he could understand from the Flamel Journal. His mother had performed Alchemy.

She had sacrificed so much for him to live on. She'd _died_ for him.

While this would have dealt a devastating blow to the Dark Side, it would not have been the end, for a single leader could be succeeded. That is, were it not for two things: The Imperius Curse, and the attack on the Longbottoms.

Voldemort's most loyal in his Inner Circle had consisted of the Lestrange Brothers, Rodolphus' wife Bellatrix, Augustus Rookwood, the Carrow Siblings and finally to the surprise of the populous, Lucius Malfoy.

The events at Longbottom Manor led to Neville Longbottom's parents Frank and Alice hospitalised permanently in St Mungos, a result of overexposure to the Torture Curse which drove them to insanity.

Bellatrix, Rodolphus, Rabastan and a minor Death Eater Baremius Crouch Junior were caught and sentenced to Life in Azkaban Prison. With their Side clearly losing, the Death Eater remnants were scattered to the winds and hunted down. The Carrows fled abroad, while Rookwood was not even suspected until sold out by a unnamed fellow Death Eater. The theorised Death Eater by the author was Luicus Malfoy.

Not long after the estimated demise of Voldemort and apparently during the Longbottom's torture, Lucius Malfoy turned himself in alongside others of his social circle. Avery, Crabbe, Goyle, Nott, Yawley and Macnair were all Imperiused, a guilt stricken Lucius Malfoy had explained, due to his own actions.

Supposedly, before he came into the open, Voldemort contacted Malfoy to convince him to fund his cause. Malfoy refused initially but when the Dark Lord threatened his wife's life, and vowed to Imperius the man himself into a suicide murder spree in Diagon Alley after using the man to kill his wife in order to destroy his family's future, he had agreed. He was supposedly paraded around as a trophy, and was sarcastically given a place within the Inner Circle for his 'contributions to the cause'. Voldemort told Lucius to arrange a meeting with his friends, wherein Voldemort Imperius'ed all of them except Lucius. Apparently this was to torture Lucius with the knowledge that he was responsible for their loss of freedom. When it was revealed he had a son on the way however, Lucius supposedly considered going to the Ministry for protection for his family and changing sides, he was caught by Voldemort who was a Master Legilimens, a mind reader.

Lucius donated massively to charities and rebuilding projects in the aftermath of the war alongside his friends, at the end of it all they were given minor community service and went free.

It was noted that some suspected that they had actually been willing Death Eaters but had already came up with a plan of action should word reach of Voldemort's death, but this was unable to be proved given the 'evidence' presented. Given that Lucius Malfoy and his friend's trials were all held in private, this was extremely suspicious.

In short, the Death Eater scum got to walk free at the cost of a small dent in their family fortunes, while their victims paid in blood and broken families. Even now, Magical Britain hadn't recovered fully from the war. Voldemort's name was still feared, and the Death Eaters had only managed to gain more power in his absence. Like the disgusting slime they were, they oozed into positions of power years after their supposed 'penance'.

The one thing that infuriated Harry however, the one thing that set his temper alight was that his mother and father had fought against Voldemort, died at his hands, yet nothing had truly changed. Even now, his mother's kind, the Muggleborn, were looked down upon for their 'lesser breeding'.

It wasn't hard to find out, all that was needed to be done was to sit in at the Leaky Cauldron for lunch for a couple days. Simple conversation overheard in the passing was very telling.

Voldemort had died, his followers scattered and rounded up, yet the ones who truly mattered, his financial backers and the supporters who weren't so obvious in their murderous ways were free today, ready to don their Death Eater garbs once again should he return.

Voldemort and his Death Eaters had been successful in their purging of the Muggleborn, Half-blood and even a few 'blood traitor' Pureblood families. It was expected that these coming years would see a rebound in fresh blood for Magical Britain, something that had the Purebloods antsy.

Truly, Harry was not disappointed, but devastated at these revelations. He had looked forward to a whole new magical world of possibilities, of wonder and perhaps for the first time in his life, making friends.

Now? He was far too worried about being attacked by the spawn of the foul terrorists at Hogwarts. He'd read the papers that announced some of the upcoming children of the 'fine members of society'.

That meaningless war over something as stupid as blood led to so many orphans and destroyed families, a scarred population and a lingering fear.

He hated that those Death Eaters had walked free. They may not have murdered his parents, but they did not hesitate to serve that maniac and murder other families in his name.

Harry made a list of all those scum who'd walked free and found photographs of them so he could put name to face.

Avery. Nott. Crabbe. Goyle. Malfoy. Macnair. Yaxley. Snape. Far too many names.

Snape apparently had seen the light and turned to spying on Voldemort, passing on information to Albus Dumbledore. Not the Ministry, because he had been worried about spies of Voldemort and possible corruption, resorting to the one man he knew that could not be turned. Harry still hadn't made up his mind on that one. For one, he bore the 'Dark Mark', the brand of loyalty to Voldemort. On the other hand, that would mean he managed to trick a Master Legilimens, not an easy feat, all the while trying to save lives.

And Sirius _fucking_ Black. His trial had been kept nice and private, due the sheer amount of people willing to kill the man for what he had done.

He'd betrayed Lily and James Potter, his life long friends turned martyrs, to Voldemort.

Finally, Harry had a person other than that sick psychopath who committed the crime to direct his anger. This was the man who was responsible for him never knowing his parents who died for him.

Harry had other, more pressing worries than a man in prison ( _too good for him,_ Harry couldn't help but think savagely) and that worry was Hogwarts.

Most of those free Death Eaters had children who would either be attending this year or already were. And wouldn't they just love to chance to lash out at the kid being blamed for killing mummy and daddy's master?

Harry knew he was hardly to most skilled at magic already, and these children would have been tutored from an early age by their Pureblood parents.

He needed that invisible advantage of being in their head so to avoid any of god knows what they'd send his way. He was still nervous around a great number of the spells as he just wasn't sure what they'd do to a person, aside the certainty of pain. Pain wasn't fun.

And so he sat watching Star Wars, admiring Darth Vader's flawless superiority over the hero.

Harry really didn't see himself as a hero, regardless of what the books and people called him.

The real, unmourned heroes were his brave parents who did not falter before death. James Potter, who gave his mother time to get him safely inside the room and position herself on the array, and Lily Potter, who had sacrificed her life for him.

They sacrificed themselves so he could live and inadvertently, so the whole of Magical Britain would be free, and what did the Magicals do? Celebrate the freedom from their cages by putting some chains! They gave the ones hunting down their very families positions of power!

Harry was scared. No, he was terrified. He was walking into a world he couldn't prepare enough for, and no magical Mokeskin coat or silly carvings would protect him from those who wanted him dead for something he wasn't even responsible for.

He could hardly go all 'Darth Vader' and turn evil, just get in with the children of murderers only to back-stab them later. Simply put, he hadn't had enough experience with having friends or sly thinking to match these kids who had fathers in the government. They'd be delighted to have him in their Slytherin house, all the easier to attack him in. The houses, oh the houses. For some reason, these 'houses', the four names that organised class timetables and living quarters meant so much more.

Slytherin was were the ambitious and sly went. Apparently it was one such shiny apple, but after the Purity War it was now rotten to the core due to self-importance, bigotry and traditions.

Gryffindor, where everybody was guessing he'd go from what he heard. All that was brave and good, those who fought against cruelty, though loudly and rashly.

Hufflebuff, where the people who were simply kindhearted, loyal to the core and nice could find a home. The house of the fools and cowards, says the others not living there.

Finally Ravenclaw, home of the introverts and the intelligent. If you came to school to learn and educate yourself, this was home. No need to get involved in squabbles and taking sides.

Harry didn't really care about the houses, however. Well, that wasn't entirely true. He was incredibly isolated, and he had never had a friend before. Before, Dudley and his gang always chased any potential children off, and it was no better with the teachers; They thought him as a delinquent. He was the 'problem child', at least that was the term they used in whispered gossip.

Nobody at school held any fond thoughts towards him, and the less said about the Dursleys the better. He had developed an amicable relationship with Mr Lapin the carver, but a man visited infrequently at his market stall was hardly a friendship. No, the only constant had been his Magic. Yet, even after all of that, Harry still held the small hope that he could make friends at the school.

However that did not mean he wouldn't still mind read them just to make sure. He'd been burned before when he dared to hope, and it lead him to dark thoughts. Of flaunting and abusing his Magic to force his co-inhabitants of number four Privet Drive into caring about him.

Thanks to those history books however, he had confirmation that the Magical World had mind reading. That meant it was possible.

From the brief description of Legilimency in 'The Rise and Fall of The Dark Arts', it wasn't as subtle as what Harry was wanting. It did eventually become unnoticeable (at least when not employed against someone skilled in Occulumency, the skill that directly countered Legilimency) but that took a Mastery in Legilimency, something that was only gained through experience, and Harry just didn't have the time to do so. Then it came to him, as he sat there watching Darth Vader taunt Luke Skywalker.

Could he mimic the Force with his Magic? The taunting and the careful manipulations used in conjunction with what seemed like 'wandless' magic, the intimidation factor of one effortlessly ripping forth parts of the area to barrage the target? He'd have to try and work on the mind games through words, but while Ollivander had said that Wand Magic was the way of the world (at least in Britain) the book had said one factor that made Voldemort so feared was his skill without a wand. He could fly unaided, he could use Legilimency without the spell, and he could manipulate his surroundings to an astounding degree of skill, often leaving his wand only for direct fighting.

Wandless practice apparently took years of patience and skill, his effortless and early use made him a terrifying foe to face.

Harry wasn't good with social interactions and talking his way out of trouble. He would probably end up dealing with the antagonising Death Eater children for seven years, unless... Unless he scared them good enough. Intimidation was always an option. He could cheat with his sentient Magic, and be using apparently Wandless Magic at age eleven! It could work.

Yet, there was another problem. He couldn't just be silent and float stuff about, no. He'd need to taunt, intimidate and degrade them. Dudley always got sloppy with catching him whenever Harry made fun of the fat whale and his friends.

Perhaps, he could even take it a step further... If he could somehow, block their use of a wand without destroying it or visibly doing anything...

But he didn't know enough to do that, simply put. He'd research possibilities at Hogwarts and put it on the back-burner for now, while he focused on mind reading. If he could mind read, he'd know what to taunt about, when to say things and what to say or do.

But how could he mind read? How could he even begin to enter another's brain and somehow understand and manipulation their neurons in such a way?

Harry supposed it was the same way magic was usually performed; knowing what is wanted and the energy known as magic taking over to fill in the gaps.

Then again, it could be possible for an energy to manipulate chemical and electrical synapses... Magic was simply not studied enough on a scientific level to really know. Honestly, it was rather strange of them to snort and laugh at 'Muggles' for not understanding magic when they don't even know about it themselves...

Harry refused to believe that magic was just that, 'magic'. They didn't use electricity, or other 'muggle means' of living, they had branched completely off. It was a different type of technology, and an advanced one. But it was still a science. A man once said, 'Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic' after all, and he was right.

Alchemy is the metaphysical science of manipulating and altering matter by using natural energy. One had to be able to actually tap into said energy to use Alchemy however, and Harry suspected that being able to use it was down to genetics and another theory he had, for why it died out like it did.

Exposure to Alchemy would eventually mutate into being able to use it. Harry theorised that the tectonic energy that ran through the planet and along highly concentrated lines, now called Ley Lines, was the reason for Alchemy and magic. Alchemists had a deeper connection, thus utilising the very energy running under to perform their art, while Magicals were possibly a lesser branch, needing their tools to easily access the 'vapour' energy, at the very top of the layers and in the air. Ley Lines were seen as magical in nature, to the point that Hogwarts was supposedly built on a crossing. He didn't have much more proof beyond these possibilities, but it seemed likely.

Alchemy could do things that magic cannot, and vice versa. Alchemists can't read minds-... Can they?


	17. The First Year Begins

**Chapter Seventeen: The First Year Begins.**

* * *

Harry sat numbly on his new four poster bed for the next seven years at Hogwarts, the window open to let in a gentle breeze. Various species of owl could be heard in the night outside; something he'd only now realised would be pretty common at Hogwarts, particularly when he resided in a tower. It had been a long week, one he'd been reflecting on after settling in his new living quarters.

He had stopped at Diagon Alley the day after he received his letter to peruse some of the places he hadn't been able to visit before alongside new items he'd need to pick up from his school list, and also send off his acceptance letter to a Minerva McGonagall, the Deputy Headmistress at Hogwarts.

The Owl Postal Office within Diagon also revealed to Harry the subscriptions available with them, several of which he ended up getting. _The Daily Prophet_ , the main newspaper of Britain. Granted it was a rather insular community, but still, it was disturbing to have a single mainstream paper that looks suspiciously government-sponsored. _The International Oracle_ was, as it could be inferred, an international paper, which would keep him up to date with foreign affairs in the new world Harry was entering.

However newspapers didn't cover fields of study in magic, so Harry then subscribed to _'The Practical Potioneer'_ , _'Transfiguration Today'_ , and _'Challenges in Charming'_. While he didn't respect Transfiguration on the principle of its usage on animals and it's pretence on pseudo-science (that silly 'mathematical' equation first years learned, honestly what the hell did bodyweight and whatever viciousness was have to do with it?), he wouldn't be foolish enough to not keep up to date with the subject.

He'd also followed up the acceptance letter to the Deputy Headmistress five days later with a request for a special pet after a fascinating encounter in that pet store with an alliteration he couldn't quite remember.

An adolescent Fire Crab had been for sale within, with its fire-spewing end, for a lack of a better word, neutered, thereby after a small deal of research into the Ministry Classifications, demoted it from a class XXX to a class XX. After a self-study crash course on Fire Crab care he applied for an 'F-COL' as it was known, or a Fire Crab Ownership Licence. Harry had sat the examination, which was applicable to an un-neutered adult, five days after his discovery of the animal; he was conveniently scored there and then at the Ministry. What a strange place that had been, he had to ask for help at the elevators.

He had achieved eighty-nine percent, though that was due to being nipped by the examination creature's left claw when he went to tag it's right due to focusing too much on the grumpy animal's snapping jaw. Frankly, he preferred the next six minutes of pain (it took so long after that partly because of the stiffness and pain in his hand, and also partly because he had to simultaneously convince his Magic not to rip the creature's legs off, and eventually they had negotiated to it sneakily immobilising the creature with its tendrils) before the examiner healed his hand when he finished over losing a finger. Aside from that, he had performed perfectly.

He'd sent a copy of his F.C.O.L alongside his request to prove he was responsible enough, and was greeted the next morning with an approval, albeit a stern one with a list of guidelines on the animal when it would be at Hogwarts. Following them, he'd purchased a two metre by two metre magically foldable habitat for it, alongside the standard carrier/sleeping quarter cage and other equipments from the pet store.

Frankly, the idea of a creature that grows precious gems and potentially minerals was too good to pass up for studying.

Since he'd purchased a true-bred male Emerald, it had cost him a small fortune, but with some TLC, it would pay back itself and more if need be. In all honesty, it was more of his kind of a pet. Not quite reptile, but close enough. Plus, it had less requirements with heating and the like, too.

Deputy Headmistress McGonagall had given him instructions for the 1st of September to take the carrier containing the Fire Crab to the conductor of the Hogwarts Express at the end of the journey, to be secured properly and safely to be sent up to his dormitory once he'd been sorted.

Indeed, Cancer the Crab was currently wandering his new surroundings in the corner of his room, his cage within the knee high walls of the portable-habitat alongside a food and water dish.

When he had arrived for the train, he looked for a compartment near the back end of the train, where he's been told the conductor would meet him when they arrived at the station in the town near Hogwarts, similarly named as Hogsmeade.

Cancer had been awake due to the general noise of the platform, but had been content to eat the mango that had been treated with dusted calcium, minerals and vitamins to supplement his diet for good emerald growth.

Harry had been content to read while the train filled with students both new and old, only stopping briefly after being startled by the whistle of the locomotive signalling its departure.

The only noises for the next twenty minutes had been the whistle of the wind as the train cut through the countryside (apparently the portal took them to a station built purely for the purpose of the Hogwarts Express near the outskirts of London to make its journey on its own dedicated track according to 'Hogwarts, a History'), the chatter of the compartment on his left, seeing as he was in the compartment right beside the storage section.

He hadn't been (and still wasn't) used to the rather quaint parchment pages, wincing occasionally with the crackles when he turned a page. Just as Harry had been wondering about how the books are created yet prevented from easy duplication, his compartment door opened, and he had been greeted with the sight of three boys. Two of them were rather large, flanking the middle blond with aristocratic features, who proceeded to zero in on his forehead.

"Apologies," the apparent leader of the group had said after a beat of silence, "we had thought that, ah, someone else was in this compartment."

Harry nodded in return before going back to his musings as the door closed, not before he heard a muttered "Must've went by him" before the trio left.

Aside from that rather odd event his train journey had been peaceful. The train barrelled through the countryside, great English fields full of crops, cows and sheep stretched across the landscape. A short, pleasant woman with a cart loaded with sweets, snacks and sandwiches had stopped by, and Harry exchanged some sickles for two ham, lettuce and tomato sandwiches. He hadn't had breakfast after he'd woke up, far too excited.

Five minutes before they'd arrive at Hogsmeade station, a voice sounded instructing they leave their luggage on the train, four minutes after this as they were pulling into the train station, Harry was able to give this voice a face in the form of the conductor who took Cancer's carrier off his hands.

As the Hogwarts students piled out of the train at the well lit Hogsmeade station (the journey had been a long one, and given the time of year it was already going dark by the time they arrived) Harry had broke off from the general hubbub and noise to follow others his height to a giant of a man bellowing for first years.

It was a long walk along a narrow trail, until the group came upon a sharp bend leading to a large, pitch black lake. Across from the body of water was the awe-inspiring sight of Hogwarts castle. It was a beautiful scene fit for a canvas, the powerful landmark piercing the night sky with its many turrets and towers.

"No more'n four to a boat!" The man leading them had called, pointing to an array of little boats waiting on the shore. Harry waited until the majority was filled before joining three others, a boy and two girls.

"Seamus Finnigan." The other boy in the boat had introduced himself when they were half way across the lake, with a recognisable Irish lilt.

"Hannah Abott." The girl with pigtails had replied, followed by a "Susan Bones" from the other.

Harry remembered swallowing down his nervousness and apprehension before giving his name. "Harry Potter."

All three had gasped, staring wide eyed at him.

"It's really you, right?" Susan had asked him, uncertainty clear. For some reason her eyes kept darting around his face.

"Yes, I am." He had replied, trying to keep the strain out of his voice. Their reactions were probably going to be commonplace, so he'd best get used to it.

Without warning Susan had held out her hand, which he shook hesitantly.

"Thank you." She had saidwith a voice thick with an emotion he couldn't properly name. "He murdered nearly my whole family in the war."

"I...You're welcome." Harry had then answered, mild irritation gone, replaced with a sense of wonder.

It had been a war, after all. Just how many had lost friends and family to that murderer, that in their eyes he'd avenged? It wasn't just celebrity awe for something he couldn't even remember and perhaps was even responsible for, he was a literal name and face for them to be grateful to, a reminder that their loved ones hadn't died for nothing.

It was then that Harry decided against revealing he knew Parseltongue, the reason for why he could understand all the snakes in the reptile house at the Zoo, and could speak it. He had read about how Voldemort had flaunted it as a means to demonstrate his heritage, taking great joy in using the serpents as a means of torture. Biting and injecting painful venoms into prisoners, even a few disgusting instances where he'd used larger breeds to eat children alive yet paralysed under spells in front of their parents, but he had planned on showing it early in his first year, following it up by showing how it could be used for good and was simply a passive ability.

Passive trait or not, the last thing the common witch and wizard needed to know was that the child they'd spent eleven years toasting to for ending the reign of terror across their society also speak to snakes. It would be a blow, rational or not, to them. Seeing as it was a secular trait within Magical Britain that was famously known for the Slytherin line, it would be seen by some as a betrayal to their dead loved ones, not that he could speak it, but the fact they had been praising him.

Before he could've been bombarded with questions, the giant man had shouted for them to mind their heads as they reached the cliff. After wondering how exactly the man had led them given his height, he'd noticed that his boat seemed to be custom, being deeper than the first year ones. Seamus snorted as a vine of ivy smacked Harry in the face when he brought his head up too early, dislodging his glasses. Harry responded maturely with blowing a raspberry, making the two girls giggle at their antics.

After a brief pause which had included the man talking to one of the boys about a toad or whatever, they finally arrived at a huge, oak door at the top of a flight of stone steps.

After a quick once over of them all from the gigantic man, he had raised an equally gigantic fist and knocked three times.

The door had responded immediately, swinging open wherein they were greeted by the sight of a tall, black-haired witch in emerald-green robes.

"The firs' years, Professor McGonagall." The man had said.

"Thank you, Hagrid. I will take them from here."

The man, Hagrid, had walked down another corridor, while Harry had focused on the stern witch. It had been his first meeting with the Deputy Headmistress beyond their correspondence.

The entrance hall she had led them to had been so big one could have fit a house within. The stone walls were lit with flaming torches that burned unnaturally in the breeze that came through the door before it closed. The ceiling was too high to make out with the little light present, and a beautiful marble staircase facing them lead to the upper floors of the castle.

They had followed the Deputy Headmistress across the stone floor, and all of them could hear the noise of hundreds of voices from a doorway to the right, but instead of leading them in the teacher showed them to a small empty chamber off the hall. They crowded in, shifting nervously.

Then, the Deputy Headmistress started speaking.

"Welcome to Hogwarts," she had started. "The start of term banquet will begin shortly, but before you take your seats in the Great Hall, you will be sorted into your houses. The Sorting is a very important ceremony because, while you are here, your house will be something like your family within Hogwarts. You will have classes with the rest of your house, sleep in your house dormitory, and spend free time in your house common room."

Here she had paused, giving them time to intake the information before continuing.

"The four houses are called Gryffindor, Hufflepuff, Ravenclaw and Slytherin. Each house has its own noble history, and each has produced outstanding witches and wizards. While you are at Hogwarts, your triumphs will earn your house points, while any rule breaking will lose house points. At the end of the year, the house with the most points is awarded the house cup, a great honour. I hope each of you will be a credit to whichever house became yours."

Here she had eyed each of them carefully, reintroducing the nervousness that had mostly dissipated.

"The Sorting Ceremony will take place in a few minutes in front of the rest of the school. I suggest you all smarten yourselves up as much as you can while you are waiting."

Several of the first years had fidgeted here, Harry himself subconsciously attempting to flatten his unruly hair.

"I shall return when we are ready for you, please wait quietly."

Then without a backwards glance, she had left the chamber.

No one had talked much except one girl who had been whispering all the spells she'd apparently learned after a redheaded boy had said to another that the method of sorting apparently involved a test.

Then, something had happened that made his heart skip a beat as several others screamed.

About twenty ghosts had just streamed through the back wall. Pearly-white, slightly transparent, honest to God ghosts.

Harry had met what he considered over the years a God or God-like being when he fell from the tree in the garden, so he was open to the idea of religion in of itself. Ghosts, however... Did that mean an afterlife exists? Why wasn't the world filled with them? Why only these select people? Could only people with magic become ghosts?

Apparently they had been discussing if they should allow the school's resident poltergeist should be allowed to attend seeing as he had been banned before, but it had been cut off when Deputy Headmistress McGonagall returned to escort them for the sorting.

The Great Hall was lit by thousands of candles that were floating in midair, over four long vertical tables where the rest of the student body were the top of the hall was another table, this time horizontal, where the schools educators sat.

The Deputy Headmistress had led them single file up there so they had came to a halt in a line facing the other students, with the teachers behind them. Dotted among the students who had stared at them were the ghosts previously seen.

The Deputy Headmistress had quietly placed a stool in front of them, which she then had proceeded to place a pointed wizard hat. For the briefed of moments, Harry thought the so-called test would be to get a rabbit out of the thing, as he tried his hardest not to laugh nervously.

Then, the thing had sung. It had sung about the Founders of the school, of the houses, and it turned out that it was its job to sort them.

Hannah had been the first to be sorted, after a brief moment she was sent off to Hufflepuff's table, which had resulted in much cheering from its residents. Next in the alphabetical order was Susan, who followed Hannah. Terry Boot was the first Ravenclaw student of their year, while Lavander Brown was the first Gryffindor. Millicent Bulstrode had the dubious honour of being the first Slytherin.

There was no set time on how long they sat under the hat it had turned out, because Seamus had been under for a good minute before finally going to Gryffindor. In contrast, Draco Malfoy, the boy who had mistakenly entered his compartment went straight to Slytherin. That had been Harry's first look at Death Eater Spawn, and what a smug blond bastard he was.

It made Harry question if family did truly come into play in regards to the sorting. Indeed, there seemed to be a group of redheads in Gryffindor with similar features to another likewise ginger boy in the line. He hadn't seen any muggleborns being sent to Slytherin, which was good to know. It had told him that the hat had a moral code.

Finally, his name was called.

"Potter, Harry!"

As he stepped forward, whispers broke out across the hall.

"Potter, did she say?"

"The Harry Potter?"

"Where's the scar?"

Before Harry could've even thought to even be baffled at the last one, the hat had been dropped over his head, obscuring his eyes due to its size.

"Hmm,"a small voice in his ear had said. "Difficult. Very Difficult. Children rarely have had much experience of the ups and downs of life, therefore making them easier to sort. But you, Mr Potter… You're something of an anomaly, aren't you?"

Harry had went to reply, only for the hat to then interrupt his train of thought.

"In your head, boy, in your head. I'll hear you." It had whispered silkily.

The hat had paused to intake his question, before replying.

"I'm talking about the fact you have knowledge, lots of it, that isn't your own. Magic as well. My, my…Such power. Such potential you have. Slytherin, maybe. It's all in your head, you could be great, you know-"

He had seized at that, and unbidden the scene that had frequented (and still did visit) his nightmares played in his mind. The gate, the grin, the helplessness. The pain from being so close to deaths door, the agony of being broken down into molecules-

"You could be great you know!"

"You will be great!"

The tendrils closing in, the eye staring unblinkingly-

"-That's it, focus on me boy. There we go."

The blinding light had shifted to the darkness from under the hat.

'What was that thing?' Harry had thought, hoping finally for the answer as he calmed his pounding heart.

"I…I don't know. I have an idea, of what it was. Beyond that? Nothing. I know you saw something, I know you have knowledge not of your own learning, but that is all. No details, Potter. Alas, while fascinating, I must return to sorting you. And do rein in those quaint little tendrils of your own, please." It had added almost as an afterthought.

Indeed, his Magic had been sporadically spasming in the air, two in particularly anxiously wringing themselves as they spiralled around the hat. From what he had worked out, his Magic was blaming the hat for whatever had happened to him, and as such was prepared to tear it in two. At his reassurance, they'd reluctantly backed down.

"Quaint." The hat had repeated. "Now let me see… Hm, potential for greatness, but looking closer, I see a firm aversion to it. Ironic that such a humble creature wields his hubris as a weapon."

Before he had a chance to understand what the hat was prattling on about, it shifted topic again.

"Hm… Hard working. A strong work ethic, it's a defining trait of yours, with all the ups and downs. But I think in Hufflepuff they can be buffed to-"

"No." He had surprised himself as much as the hat.

"No? Ravenclaw is the only other near enough match, but I disagree on sending you there. No matter how much knowledge you have, you do not learn for the sake of learning, nor do you particularly care for things outside your own personal interest. And, no matter just how much your foolish pride disagrees, Hufflepuff is the best suited for you, not your vain idea of the best house, boy."

'They'll hate me in Hufflepuff.' He had tried to argue, thinking of his own isolationism compared to their friendliness, and almost subconsciously, the worry of what people would think about The-Boy-Who-Lived being a Hufflepuff. He'd had enough of bullying.

In Ravenclaw, he'd have space. Away from the conflict between houses, away from the attention he hadn't had before, the chance to learn magic and alchemy at his pace while taking it slow to make what friends he wanted.

"I care little for personal habits, and less for politics." The hat said firmly. "They will help you, Potter. I ask that you trust in me to do my job."

He had paused to think then, and the hat kindly gave him the time to do so.

'Could I really trust it to do what's best for me?' He had wondered.

Unbidden came thoughts of the Durlseys, his teachers, his own Magic. Only one of them had stayed true to Harry.

"No. Ravenclaw."

It had been quiet for a moment, then the hat answered, colder than before.

"Pride cometh before the fall, Potter." It had warned in his head. "RAVENCLAW!" The hat had then bellowed aloud.

As he stood up to take it off, it had gave him one last message.

"It seems you learn better from hard lessons. Don't say I didn't warn you."

There was a beat of surprised silence, before cautious applause from the tables of yellow, red and green were drowned out by the enthusiastic clapping from the sea of blue.

Harry had took his seat next to Kevin Entwhistle who'd already been sorted to Ravenclaw, then the remaining three in the line were sorted and Dumbledore said a few rather odd words before the feast started. Harry hadn't honestly been paying attention, he'd been too busy thinking on the hat's words. after that, it was somewhat of a blur.

The neverending questions about his scar, or lack of, took up the majority of the feast. It wasn't something he had really noticed, or bothered to think over. Scars fade and become paler, less noticeable over time, true, but he had forgotten the fifth law of Elemental Transfiguration, Dark Magick's nature cannot be changed. He had somehow survived the Killing Curse, but he had still been marked. His scar had supposedly been a Curse Scar, which cannot be healed at all, not by internal or external methods. Even limbs that had been took from spells in that branch of magic could not be regrown. Therefore, it couldn't have came from Dark Magic that had scarred him. So, had he actually survived the Killing Curse at all, then? That was the question that had been murmuring in the hall.

Dark Magic had supposedly been detected within, but it couldn't have came from the curse itself, seeing as it had healed. Perhaps it had simply been residue that had dissipated? His scar was something else, but whatever it was, one fact remained which had the school and eventually the rest of Britain talking. He was not The-Boy-Who-Lived.

It worried Harry, though. He had never questioned though, why his Magic even existed in that form. Nobody else he could see had the answer. It was when he had been contemplating his healed scar, that the epiphany struck.

Internal and external.

He had so much difficulty using a wand because he didn't have very much magic within him. All of his was just at the surface of him, beyond his flesh. It was external, while others had their internal magic pushed externally by the wand.

The Killing Curse was widely debated on how exactly it killed. Resuscitation was impossible and never worked on anyone, magical or muggle, who had been struck by the curse.

There were numerous theories on why this failed. One said the spell ripped out the targets soul, explaining why it's impossible to be brought back to life after it. Harry however subscribed to another which bordered close to this. Magic as it is known is in everything, it's the spiritual life blood, the energy, of every living being. Perhaps that is what souls are made of. Regardless, this theory stated that the Killing Curse rips out that energy, which causes instantaneous death. Normally, this energy would leave after death occurs, but what the Killing Curse does is accelerates this. It's why there is no mark, internal or external.

Maybe he had been struck with the Killing Curse, but something that his mother had done had made it so he hadn't died from it. That's why his magic is outside his body, and not in it. Whatever had been done had halted the progress, or even possibly returned him back to his body.

Yet this would never be believed. The only reason the people had believed that, on Halloween of October the thirty-first in nineteen eighty one, a child had actually lived after being struck by the Killing Curse was because of the evidence from the investigation.

Voldemort had been confirmed to have been there and had died in the nursery room, and evidence showed that Lily and James Potter had already been killed by the Killing Curse. No explanation could be found for why Harry had lived, but the theory was that Lily Potter had activated the strange runes under the carpet to reflect whatever was cast at the person within, in this case Voldemort's Killing Curse aimed at Harry.

He had heard at the time the ongoing debate with three older Ravenclaws several seats down. One was of the opinion that the spell hadn't actually made contact with him, and the spell had simply reflected back once it reached the perimeter of the chalked circle. Several others had nodded in agreement.

The only reason he could use a wand to the proficiency he could without his Magic's assistance was the Belief Magic fed to him by believers and those who praised The-Boy-Who-Lived, Harry had theorised.

After tonight, that belief would be firmly destroyed once the newspapers got wind of it tonight, and tomorrow morning at breakfast every witch and wizard across the country would know the belief they had held for nearly ten years was a lie.

At that point in time when he had been pushing around the remains of his meal on the plate, he had the brief thought that maybe now he wouldn't have to hide the fact he was a parselmouth.

When the desserts too disappeared, Harry got his first true look at Dumbledore as the Headmaster got to his feet again. An old man with a ever present smile hidden within a magnificent beard that reached his waist, colourful robes with many patterns which Harry was sure were odd even by magical standards.

"Just a few more words now that we are all fed and watered. I have a few start-of-term notices to give you. First years should note that the forest on the grounds is aptly named as the 'Forbidden Forest'. A few of our older students would do well to heed the name as well."

The Headmaster's eyes flashed in the direction of the Gryffindor table, as his smile became a tad wider.

"I have also been asked by Mr Filch, the caretaker, to remind you all that no magic should be used between classes in the corridors. Quidditch trials will be held in the second week of the term. Anyone interested in playing for their house teams should contact Madam Hooch."

He had paused for a moment to let the student body digest this before continuing.

"And finally, I must tell you that this year, the third-floor corridor on the right-hand side is out of bounds to everyone who does not wish to die a very painful death."

Harry's eyes had widened at this, utterly in shock. It seemed a few others were equally baffled. He was too busy thinking of all the wrong things that could happen from saying something like this to a school full of children.

What followed then was some horrid singing and a badly written song before bed. It was a long climb up the stairs of the school to their tower, and it was only the Ravenclaw first years being lead by the two prefects of the house, having been instructed to wait and let the rest of the tables.

The female prefect, Penelope Clearwater, had given them helpful pointers on navigating the school and in particular the stairs, while the male prefect, Marcus Turner, had explained to them some of the particulars about Ravenclaw House. He had seen the Communal Library in the common room himself, and it was quite impressive. Unlike the Hogwarts library, it had muggle subjects and books, both non-fiction and fiction. It was purely based on donations and books Professor Flitwick, their Head of House, had bought out of his own pocket. It was nice to know that if something happened to a school book, be it getting lost or ending up needing replaced, there was several spares available that had been donated by previous students while the situation was resolved.

Penelope explained the layout of the tower when they entered the common room. By the statue of Rowena Ravenclaw, tucked inside the Communal Library was the door leading up to the dormitories. Gryffindor and Hufflepuff had communal dorms, while Slytherin and Ravenclaw had a room per student. This was simply down to the house values and a touch of favouritism. Gryffindor encouraged camaraderie and Hufflepuff held teamwork as core values, and so had dormitories to keep the inhabitants as a tight-knit group. Rowena Ravenclaw however held a firm belief in responsibility and learning at the key traits of her house, while Slytherin said practicality was the best virtue. He simply felt that they had the room for the single rooms in the dungeons, and so installed them. In Ravenclaw Tower however, the single rooms were both a blessing and a curse. Slytherin had their rooms pre-furnished and cared for by House Elves apparently, the same going for the other two communal house dorms.

In Ravenclaw Tower, first years are given a four poster bed and a basic desk. Everything else was either broken or missing.

It was to encourage them to learn to think for themselves and be given a degree of independence, Marcus had explained. Instead of waiting to learn repairing charms, they were to look them up themselves. These were all spells and techniques needed for later life, but the Prefects were happy to assist in some things.

Also, they were expected to keep their own place tidy and clean, as unlike the other three houses, the Elves did not keep the rooms clean.

Harry had already made a start on using to repair what he could of the wardrobe, but had settled for just having it not fall apart through the night. Cancer's area had already been helpfully set up, presumably by Professor Flitwick. Harry made a note to thank the man when he met him.

Harry's window had a brilliant view of the Quidditch Pitch, and behind it, the Forbidden Forest. He briefly wondered if it would be noticed when he nicked a tree or two from it. He'd need to wood to furnish the room, and keep his Magic happy with being able to continue carving.

Glaring at the bland desk, he heaved a sigh. He would definitely learn some sort of Shrinking Charm and bring his own one. The only thing on the desk, since he hadn't unpacked his trunk aside from sleepwear, was a single note Penelope had passed to him, which she said she'd been given from Professor Flitwick for him.

Only, it wasn't actually Professor Flitwick who had written it. It read:

 _Dear Mr. Potter,_

 _I'd be most grateful if you did not mind attending a meeting tomorrow evening at seven o'clock at my office. It is located on the second floor at the end of the Gargoyle Corridor. Simply say the password and you shall be granted access._

 _I have many important things to discuss with you, from the strangeness of a magical septopus to my fondness for Chocolate Frogs. Congratulations on your sorting._

 _Albus Dumbledore._

It had took Harry's tired mind a good minute to comprehend what the man was talking about. It only clicked when he saw his Magic go to close the window, sensing that the room was now too cold.

Septopus. Somehow, the Headmaster had been able to see his Magic. The other part was presumably the password.

While at first he had been worried, now he saw this as an opportunity. There were many things he wanted to ask the Headmaster about. But they could wait. For now, he needed to sleep. He would need it.


End file.
